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Title: The Sceptical Chymist

Author: Robert Boyle

Release date: October 8, 2007 [eBook #22914]

Language: English

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THE

SCEPTICAL CHYMIST:

OR

CHYMICO-PHYSICAL

Doubts & Paradoxes,
Touching the

SPAGYRIST’S PRINCIPLES
Commonly call’d

H Y P O S TAT I C A L ,
As they are wont to be Propos’d and
Defended by the Generality of

ALCHYMISTS.
Whereunto is præmis’d Part of another Discourse
relating to the same Subject.

BY

The Honourable ROBERT BOYLE, Esq;

LONDON,

Printed by J. Cadwell for J. Crooke, and are to be
Sold at the Ship in St. Paul’s Church-Yard.

MDCLXI.

CONTENTS
A Præface Introductory
Physiological Considerations
The First Part
The Second Part
The Third Part
The Fourth Part
The Fifth Part
The Sixth Part
The Conclusion
Printer’s Note
Errata

A

P R Æ FA C E

INTRODUCTORY
To the following Treatise.

O give the Reader an account, Why the following Treatise
is suffer’d to pass abroad so maim’d and imperfect, I must
inform him that ’tis now long since, that to gratify an
ingenious Gentleman, I set down some of the Reasons that
kept me from fully acquiescing either in the Peripatetical,
or in the Chymical Doctrine, of the Material Principles of
mixt Bodies. This Discourse some years after falling into the hands of some
Learned men, had the good luck to be so favourably receiv’d, and
advantageously spoken of by them, that having had more then ordinary
Invitations given me to make it publick, I thought fit to review it, that I
might retrench some things that seem’d not so fit to be shewn to every
Reader, And substitute some of those other things that occurr’d to me of the
trials and observations I had since made. What became of my papers, I
elsewhere mention in a Preface where I complain of it: But since I writ
That, I found many sheets that belong’d to the subjects I am now about to
discourse of. Wherefore seeing that I had then in my hands as much of the
first Dialogue as was requisite to state the Case, and serve for an
Introduction as well to the conference betwixt Carneades and Eleutherius,
as to some other Dialogues, which for certain reasons are not now herewith
publish’d, I resolv’d to supply, as well as I could, the Contents of a Paper
belonging to the second of the following Discourses, which I could not
possibly retrive, though it were the chief of them all. And having once more

try’d the Opinion of Friends, but not of the same, about this imperfect work,
I found it such, that I was content in complyance with their Desires; that not
only it should be publish’d, but that it should be publish’d as soon as
conveniently might be. I had indeed all along the Dialogues spoken of my
self, as of a third Person; For, they containing Discourses which were
among the first Treatises that I ventur’d long ago to write of matters
Philosophical, I had reason to desire, with the Painter, to latere pone
tabulam, and hear what men would say of them, before I own’d my self to
be their Author. But besides that now I find, ’tis not unknown to many who it
is that writ them, I am made to believe that ’tis not inexpedient, they should
be known to come from a Person not altogether a stranger to Chymical
Affairs. And I made the lesse scruple to let them come abroad
uncompleated, partly, because my affairs and Præ-ingagements to publish
divers other Treatises allow’d me small hopes of being able in a great while
to compleat these Dialogues. And partly, because I am not unapt to think,
that they may come abroad seasonably enough, though not for the Authors
reputation, yet for other purposes. For I observe, that of late Chymistry
begins, as indeed it deserves, to be cultivated by Learned Men who before
despis’d it; and to be pretended to by many who never cultivated it, that
they may be thought not to ignore it: Whence it is come to passe, that divers
Chymical Notions about Matters Philosophical are taken for granted and
employ’d, and so adopted by very eminent Writers both Naturalists and
Physitians. Now this I fear may prove somewhat prejudicial to the
Advancement of solid Philosophy: For though I am a great Lover of
Chymical Experiments, and though I have no mean esteem of divers
Chymical Remedies, yet I distinguish these from their Notions about the
causes of things, and their manner of Generation. And for ought I can
hitherto discern, there are a thousand Phænomena in Nature, besides a
Multitude of Accidents relating to the humane Body, which will scarcely be
clearly & satisfactorily made out by them that confine themselves to deduce
things from Salt, Sulphur and Mercury, and the other Notions peculiar to
the Chymists, without taking much more Notice than they are wont to do, of
the Motions and Figures, of the small Parts of Matter, and the other more
Catholick and Fruitful affections of Bodies. Wherefore it will not perhaps be
now unseasonable to let our Carneades warne Men, not to subscribe to the
grand Doctrine of the Chymists touching their three Hypostatical
Principles, till they have a little examin’d it, and consider’d, how they can

clear it from his Objections, divers of which ’tis like they may never have
thought on; since a Chymist scarce would, and none but a Chymist could
propose them. I hope also it will not be unacceptable to several Ingenious
Persons, who are unwilling to determine of any important Controversie,
without a previous consideration of what may be said on both sides, and yet
have greater desires to understand Chymical Matters, than Opportunities of
learning them, to find here together, besides several Experiments of my own
purposely made to Illustrate the Doctrine of the Elements, divers others
scarce to be met with, otherwise then Scatter’d among many Chymical
Books. And to Find these Associated Experiments so Deliver’d as that an
Ordinary Reader, if he be but Acquainted with the usuall Chymical Termes,
may easily enough Understand Them; and even a wary One may safely rely
on Them. These Things I add, because a Person any Thing vers’d in the
Writings of Chymists cannot but Discern by their obscure, Ambiguous, and
almost Ænigmatical Way of expressing what they pretend to Teach, that they
have no Mind, to be understood at all, but by the Sons of Art (as they call
them) nor to be Understood even by these without Difficulty And Hazardous
Tryalls. Insomuch that some of Them Scarce ever speak so candidly, as
when they make use of that known Chymical Sentence; Ubi palam locuti
fumus, ibi nihil diximus. And as the obscurity of what some Writers deliver
makes it very difficult to be understood; so the Unfaithfulness of too many
others makes it unfit to be reli’d on. For though unwillingly, Yet I must for
the truths sake, and the Readers, warne him not to be forward to believe
Chymical Experiments when they are set down only by way of
Prescriptions, and not of Relations; that is, unless he that delivers them
mentions his doing it upon his own particular knowledge, or upon the
Relation of some credible person, avowing it upon his own experience. For
I am troubled, I must complain, that even Eminent Writers, both Physitians
and Philosophers, whom I can easily name, if it be requir’d, have of late
suffer’d themselves to be so far impos’d upon, as to Publish and Build upon
Chymical Experiments, which questionless they never try’d; for if they had,
they would, as well as I, have found them not to be true. And indeed it were
to be wish’d, that now that those begin to quote Chymical Experiments that
are not themselves Acquainted with Chymical Operations, men would Leave
off that Indefinite Way of Vouching the Chymists say this, or the Chymists
affirme that, and would rather for each Experiment they alledge name the
Author or Authors, upon whose credit they relate it; For, by this means they

would secure themselves from the suspition of falshood (to which the other
Practice Exposes them) and they would Leave the Reader to Judge of what
is fit for him to Believe of what is Deliver’d, whilst they employ not their
own great names to Countenance doubtfull Relations; and they will also do
Justice to the Inventors or Publishers of true Experiments, as well as upon
the Obtruders of false ones. Whereas by that general Way of quoting the
Chymists, the candid Writer is Defrauded of the particular Praise, and the
Impostor escapes the Personal Disgrace that is due to him.
The remaining Part of this Præface must be imploy’d in saying something
for Carneades, and something for my Self.
And first, Carneades hopes that he will be thought to have disputed civilly
and Modestly enough for one that was to play the Antagonist and the
Sceptick. And if he any where seem to sleight his Adversaries Tenents and
Arguments, he is willing to have it look’d upon as what he was induc’d to,
not so much by his Opinion of them, as the Examples of Themistius and
Philoponus, and the custom of such kind of Disputes.
Next, In case that some of his Arguments shall not be thought of the most
Cogent sort that may be, he hopes it will be consider’d that it ought not to
be Expected, that they should be So. For, his Part being chiefly but to
propose Doubts and Scruples, he does enough, if he shews that his
Adversaries Arguments are not strongly Concluding, though his own be not
so neither. And if there should appear any disagreement betwixt the things
he delivers in divers passages, he hopes it will be consider’d, that it is not
necessary that all the things a Sceptick Proposes, should be consonant;
since it being his work to Suggest doubts against the Opinion he questions,
it is allowable for him to propose two or more severall Hypotheses about
the same thing: And to say that it may be accounted for this way, or that
way, or the other Way, though these wayes be perhaps inconsistent among
Themselves. Because it is enough for him, if either of the proposed
Hypotheses be but as probable as that he calls a question. And if he
proposes many that are Each of them probable, he does the more satisfie his
doubts, by making it appear the more difficult to be sure, that that which
they alwayes differ from is the true. And our Carneades by holding the
Negative, he has this Advantage, that if among all the Instances he brings to
invalidate all the Vulgar Doctrine of those he Disputes with, any one be

Irrefragable, that alone is sufficient to overthrow a Doctrine which
Universally asserts what he opposes. For, it cannot be true, that all Bodies
whatsoever that are reckon’d among the Perfectly mixt Ones, are
Compounded of such a Determinate Number of such or such Ingredients, in
case any one such Body can be produc’d, that is not so compounded; and
he hopes too, that Accurateness will be the less expected from him, because
his undertaking obliges him to maintain such Opinions in Chymistry, and
that chiefly by Chymical Arguments, as are Contrary to the very Principles
of the Chymists; From whose writings it is not Therefore like he should
receive any intentionall Assistance, except from some Passages of the Bold
and Ingenious Helmont, with whom he yet disagrees in many things (which
reduce him to explicate Divers Chymical Phænomena, according to other
Notions;) And of whose Ratiocinations, not only some seem very
Extravagant, but even the Rest are not wont to be as considerable as his
Experiments. And though it be True indeed, that some Aristotelians have
occasionally written against the Chymical Doctrine he Oppugnes, yet since
they have done it according to their Principles, And since our Carneades
must as well oppose their Hypothesis as that of the Spagyrist, he was fain to
fight his Adversaries with their own Weapons, Those of the Peripatetick
being Improper, if not hurtfull for a Person of his Tenents; besides that
those Aristotelians, (at Least, those he met with,) that have written against
the Chymists, seem to have had so little Experimental Knowledge in
Chymical Matters, that by their frequent Mistakes and unskilfull Way of
Oppugning, they have too often expos’d Themselves to the Derision of their
Adversaries, for writing so Confidently against what they appear so little to
understand.
And Lastly, Carneades hopes, he shall doe the Ingenious this Piece of
service, that by having Thus drawn the Chymists Doctrine out of their Dark
and Smoakie Laboratories, and both brought it into the open light, and
shewn the weakness of their Proofs, that have hitherto been wont to be
brought for it, either Judicious Men shall henceforth be allowed calmly and
after due information to disbelieve it, or those abler Chymists, that are
zealous for the reputation of it, will be oblig’d to speak plainer then hitherto
has been done, and maintain it by better Experiments and Arguments then
Those Carneades hath examin’d: so That he hopes, the Curious will one
Way or other Derive either satisfaction or instruction from his endeavours.

And as he is ready to make good the profession he makes in the close of his
Discourse, he being ready to be better inform’d, so he expects either to be
indeed inform’d, or to be let alone. For Though if any Truly knowing
Chymists shall Think fit in a civil and rational way to shew him any truth
touching the matter in Dispute That he yet discernes not, Carneades will not
refuse either to admit, or to own a Conviction: yet if any impertinent Person
shall, either to get Himself a Name, or for what other end soever, wilfully or
carelesly mistake the State of the Controversie, or the sence of his
Arguments, or shall rail instead of arguing, as hath been done of Late in
Print by divers Chymists; G. and F. and H. and others, in their books against one
another. or lastly, shall write against them in a canting way; I mean, shall
express himself in ambiguous or obscure termes, or argue from experiments
not intelligibly enough Deliver’d, Carneades professes, That he values his
time so much, as not to think the answering such Trifles worth the loss of it.
And now having said thus much for Carneades, I hope the Reader will give
me leave to say something too for my self.
And first, if some morose Readers shall find fault with my having made the
Interlocutors upon occasion complement with one another, and that I have
almost all along written these Dialogues in a stile more Fashionable then
That of meer scholars is wont to be, I hope I shall be excus’d by them that
shall consider, that to keep a due decorum in the Discourses, it was fit that
in a book written by a Gentleman, and wherein only Gentlemen are
introduc’d as speakers, the Language should be more smooth, and the
Expressions more civil than is usual in the more Scholastick way of writing.
And indeed, I am not sorry to have this Opportunity of giving an example
how to manage even Disputes with Civility; whence perhaps some Readers
will be assisted to discern a Difference betwixt Bluntness of speech and
Strength of reason, and find that a man may be a Champion for Truth,
without being an Enemy to Civility; and may confute an Opinion without
railing at Them that hold it; To whom he that desires to convince and not to
provoke them, must make some amends by his Civility to their Persons, for
his severity to their mistakes; and must say as little else as he can, to
displease them, when he says that they are in an error.
But perhaps other Readers will be less apt to find fault with the Civility of
my Disputants, than the Chymists will be, upon the reading of some

Passages of the following Dialogue, to accuse Carneades of Asperity. But if
I have made my Sceptick sometimes speak sleightingly of the Opinions he
opposes, I hope it will not be found that I have done any more, than became
the Part he was to act of an Opponent: Especially, if what I have made him
say be compar’d with what the Prince of the Romane Orators himself
makes both great Persons and Friends say of one anothers Opinions, in his
excellent Dialogues, De Natura Deorum: And I shall scarce be suspected of
Partiality, in the case, by them that take Notice that there is full as much (if
not far more) liberty of sleighting their Adversaries Tenents to be met with
in the Discourses of those with whom Carneades disputes. Nor needed I
make the Interlocutors speak otherwise then freely in a Dialogue, wherein it
was sufficiently intimated, that I meant not to declare my own Opinion of
the Arguments propos’d, much lesse of the whole Controversy it self
otherwise than as it may by an attentive Reader be guess’d at by some
Passages of Carneades: (I say, some Passages, because I make not all that
he says, especially in the heat of Disputation, mine,) partly in this
Discourse, and partly in some other Dialogues betwixt the same speakers
(though they treat not immediately of the Elements) which have long layn by
me, and expect the Entertainment that these present Discourses will meet
with. And indeed they will much mistake me, that shall conclude from what I
now publish, that I am at Defyance with Chymistry, or would make my
Readers so. I hope the Specimina I have lately publish’d of an attempt to
shew the usefulness of Chymical Experiments to Contemplative
Philosophers, will give those that shall read them other thoughts of me: & I
had a design (but wanted opportunity) to publish with these Papers an
Essay I have lying by me, the greater part of which is Apologetical for one
sort of Chymists. And at least, as for those that know me, I hope the pain I
have taken in the fire will both convince them, that I am far from being an
Enemy to the Chymists Art, (though I am no friend to many that disgrace it
by professing it,) and perswade them to believe me when I declare that I
distinguish betwixt those Chymists that are either Cheats, or but Laborants,
and the true Adepti; By whom, could I enjoy their Conversation, I would
both willingly and thankfully be instructed; especially concerning the
Nature and Generation of Metals: And possibly, those that know how little I
have remitted of my former addictedness to make Chymical Experiments,
will easily believe, that one of the chief Designes of this Sceptical Discourse
was, not so much to discredit Chymistry, as to give an occasion and a kind

of necessity to the more knowing Artists to lay aside a little of their over-
great Reservedness, & either explicate or prove the Chymical Theory better
than ordinary Chymists have done, or by enriching us with some of their
nobler secrets to evince that Their art is able to make amends even for the
deficiencies of their Theory: And thus much I shall here make bold to add,
that we shall much undervalue Chymistry, if we imagine, that it cannot
teach us things farr more useful, not only to Physick but to Philosophy, than
those that are hitherto known to vulgar Chymists. And yet as for inferiour
Spagyrists themselves, they have by their labours deserv’d so well of the
Common-wealth of Learning, that methinks ’tis Pity they should ever misse
the Truth which they have so industriously sought. And though I be no
Admirer of the Theorical Part of their Art, yet my conjectures will much
deceive me, if the Practical Part be not much more cultivated than hitherto
it has been, and do not both employ Philosophy and Philosophers, and help
to make men such. Nor would I that have been diverted by other Studies as
well as affairs, be thought to pretend being a profound Spagyrist, by finding
so many faults in the Doctrine wherein the Generality of Chymists scruples
not to Acquiesce: For besides that ’tis most commonly far easier to frame
Objections against any propos’d Hypothesis, than to propose an
Hypothesis not lyable to Objections (besides this I say) ’tis no such great
matter, if whereas Beginners in Chymistry are commonly at once imbu’d
with the Theory and Operations of their profession, I who had the good
Fortune to Learn the Operations from illiterate Persons, upon whose credit
I was not Tempted to take up any opinion about them, should consider
things with lesse prejudice, and consequently with other Eyes than the
Generality of Learners; And should be more dispos’d to accommodate the
Phænomena that occur’d to me to other Notions than to those of the
Spagyrists. And having at first entertain’d a suspition That the Vulgar
Principles were lesse General and comprehensive, or lesse considerately
Deduc’d from Chymical Operations, than was believ’d; it was not uneasie
for me both to Take notice of divers Phænomena, overlook’d by prepossest
Persons, that seem’d not to suite so well with the Hermetical Doctrine; and,
to devise some Experiments likely to furnish me with Objections against it,
not known to many, that having practis’d Chymistry longer perchance then
I have yet liv’d, may have far more Experience, Than I, of particular
processes.

To conclude, whether the Notions I have propos’d, and the Experiments I
have communicated, be considerable, or not, I willingly leave others to
Judge; and This only I shall say for my Self, That I have endeavour’d to
deliver matters of Fact, so faithfully, that I may as well assist the lesse
skilful Readers to examine the Chymical Hypothesis, as provoke the
Spagyrical Philosophers to illustrate it: which if they do, and that either the
Chymical opinion, or the Peripatetick, or any other Theory of the Elements
differing from that I am most inclin’d to, shall be intelligibly explicated, and
duly prov’d to me; what I have hitherto discours’d will not hinder it from
making a Proselyte of a Person that Loves Fluctuation of Judgment little
enough to be willing to be eas’d of it by any thing but Error.

PHYSIOLOGICAL

C O N S I D E R AT I O N S
Touching

The experiments wont to be
employed to evince either
the IV Peripatetick
Elements, or the III
Chymical Principles of
Mixt Bodies.

Part of the First Dialogue.

Perceive that divers of my Friends have thought it very
strange to hear me speak so irresolvedly, as I have been
wont to do, concerning those things which some take to be
the Elements, and others to be the Principles of all mixt
Bodies. But I blush not to acknowledge that I much lesse
scruple to confess that I Doubt, when I do so, then to profess
that I Know what I do not: And I should have much stronger Expectations
then I dare yet entertain, to see Philosophy solidly establish’t, if men would
more carefully distinguish those things that they know, from those that they
ignore or do but think, and then explicate clearly the things they conceive
they understand, acknowledge ingenuously what it is they ignore, and
profess so candidly their Doubts, that the industry of intelligent persons
might be set on work to make further enquiries, and the easiness of less
discerning Men might not be impos’d on. But because a more particular
accompt will probably be expected of my unsatisfyedness not only with the
Peripatetick, but with the Chymical Doctrine of the Primitive Ingredients of
Bodies: It may possibly serve to satisfy others of the excusableness of my
disatisfaction to peruse the ensuing Relation of what passed a while since at
a meeting of persons of several opinions, in a place that need not here be
named; where the subject whereof we have been speaking, was amply and
variously discours’d of.
It was on one of the fairest dayes of this Summer that the inquisitive
Eleutherius came to invite me to make a visit with him to his friend
Carneades. I readily consented to this motion, telling him that if he would
but permit me to go first and make an excuse at a place not far off, where I
had at that hour appointed to meet, but not about a business either of
moment, or that could not well admit of a delay, I would presently wait on
him, because of my knowing Carneades to be so conversant with nature
and with Furnaces, and so unconfin’d to vulgar Opinions, that he would
probably by some ingenious Paradox or other, give our mindes at least a

pleasing Exercise, and perhaps enrich them with some solid instruction.
Eleutherius then first going with me to the place where my Apology was to
be made, I accompanied him to the lodging of Carneades, where when we
were come, we were told by the Servants, that he was retired with a couple
of Friends (whose names they also told us) to one of the Arbours in his
Garden, to enjoy under its coole shades a delightful protection from the yet
troublesome heat of the Sun.
Eleutherius being perfectly acquainted with that Garden immediately led
me to the Arbour, and relying on the intimate familiarity that had been long
cherish’d betwixt him and Carneades; in spight of my Reluctancy to what
might look like an intrusion upon his privacy, drawing me by the hand, he
abruptly entered the Arbour, where we found Carneades, Philoponus, and
Themistius, sitting close about a little round Table, on which besides paper,
pen, and inke, there lay two or three open Books; Carneades appeared not
at all troubled at this surprise, but rising from the Table, received his Friend
with open looks and armes, and welcoming me also with his wonted
freedom and civility, invited us to rest our selves by him, which, as soon as
we had exchanged with his two Friends (who were ours also) the civilities
accustomed on such occasions, we did. And he presently after we had
seated our selves, shutting the Books that lay open, and turning to us with a
smiling countenance seemed ready to begin some such unconcerning
discourse as is wont to pass or rather waste the time in promiscuous
companies.
But Eleutherius guessing at what he meant to do, prevented him by telling
him, I perceive Carneades by the books that you have been now shutting,
and much more by the posture wherein I found Persons qualifi’d to
discourse of serious matters; and so accustom’d to do it, that you three were
before our coming, engag’d in some Philosophical conference, which I
hope you will either prosecute, and allow us to be partakers of, in
recompence of the freedome we have us’d in presuming to surprise you, or
else give us leave to repair the injury we should otherwise do you, by
leaving you to the freedom we have interrupted, and punishing our selves
for our boldness by depriving our selves of the happiness of your company.
With these last words he and I rose up, as if we meant to be gone, But
Carneades suddenly laying hold on his arme, and stopping him by it,
smileingly told him, We are not so forward to lose good company as you

seem to imagine; especially since you are pleas’d to desire to be present at
what we shall say, about such a Subject as that You found us considering.
For that, being the number of the Elements, Principles, or Materiall
Ingredients of Bodies, is an enquiry whose truth is of that Importance, and
of that Difficulty, that it may as well deserve as require to be searched into
by such skilfull Indagators of Nature as your selves. And therefore we sent
to invite the bold and acute Leucippus to lend us some light by his Atomical
Paradox, upon which we expected such pregnant hints, that ’twas not
without a great deal of trouble that we had lately word brought us that he
was not to be found; and we had likewise begg’d the Assistance of your
presence and thoughts, had not the messenger we employ’d to Leucippus
inform’d us, that as he was going, he saw you both pass by towards another
part of the Town; And this frustrated expectation of Leucippus his company,
who told me but last night that he would be ready to give me a meeting
where I pleas’d to day, having very long suspended our conference about
the freshly mention’d Subject, it was so newly begun when you came in,
that we shall scarce need to repeat any thing to acquaint you with what has
pass’d betwixt us before your arrival, so that I cannot but look upon it as a
fortunate Accident that you should come so seasonably, to be not hearers
alone, but we hope Interlocutors at our conference. For we shall not only
allow of your presence at it, but desire your Assistance in it; which I adde
both for other reasons, and because though these learned Gentlemen (sayes
he, turning to his two friends) need not fear to discourse before any
Auditory, provided it be intelligent enough to understand them, yet for my
part (continues he with a new smile,) I shall not dare to vent my
unpremeditated thoughts before two such Criticks, unless by promising to
take your turnes of speaking, You will allow me mine of quarrelling, with
what has been said. He and his friends added divers things to convince us
that they were both desirous that we should hear them, and resolved against
our doing so, unless we allowed them sometimes to hear us. Elutherius after
having a while fruitlesly endeavoured to obtain leave to be silent promis’d
he would not be so alwayes, provided that he were permitted according to
the freedom of his Genious and Principles to side with one of them in the
managing of one Argument, and, if he saw cause, with his Antagonist, in the
Prosecution of another, without being confin’d to stick to any one party or
Opinion, which was after some debate accorded him. But I conscious to my
own Disability’s told them resolutely that I was as much more willing as

more fit to be a hearer then a speaker, among such knowing Persons, and on
so abstruse a Subject. And that therefore I beseeched them without
necessitating me to proclaim my weaknesses, to allow me to lessen them by
being a silent Auditor of their Discourses: to suffer me to be at which I
could present them no motive, save that their instructions would make them
in me a more intelligent Admirer. I added, that I desir’d not to be idle whilst
they were imploy’d, but would if they pleas’d, by writing down in short
hand what should be delivered, preserve Discourses that I knew would
merit to be lasting. At first Carneades and his two friends utterly rejected
this motion; and all that my Resoluteness to make use of my ears, not
tongue, at their debates, could do, was to make them acquiesce in the
Proposition of Eleutherius, who thinking himself concern’d, because he
brought me thither, to afford me some faint assistance, was content that I
should register their Arguments, that I might be the better able after the
conclusion of their conference to give them my sence upon the Subject of it,
(The number of Elements or Principles:) which he promis’d I should do at
the end of the present Debates, if time would permit, or else at our next
meeting. And this being by him undertaken in my name, though without my
consent, the company would by no means receive my Protestation against
it, but casting, all at once, their eyes on Carneades, they did by that and
their unanimous silence, invite him to begin; which (after a short pause,
during which he turn’d himself to Eleutherius and me) he did in this
manner.
Notwithstanding the subtile reasonings I have met with in the books of the
Peripateticks, and the pretty experiments that have been shew’d me in the
Laboratories of Chymists, I am of so diffident, or dull a Nature, as to think
that if neither of them can bring more cogent arguments to evince the truth
of their assertion then are wont to be brought; a Man may rationally enough
retain some doubts concerning the very number of those materiall
Ingredients of mixt bodies, which some would have us call Elements, and
others principles. Indeed when I considered that the Tenents concerning the
Elements are as considerable amongst the Doctrines of natural Philosophy
as the Elements themselves are among the bodies of the Universe, I
expected to find those Opinions solidly establish’d, upon which so many
others are superstructed. But when I took the pains impartially to examine
the bodies themselves that are said to result from the blended Elements, and

to torture them into a confession of their constituent Principles, I was
quickly induc’d to think that the number of the Elements has been
contended about by Philosophers with more earnestness then success. This
unsatisfiedness of mine has been much wonder’d at, by these two
Gentlemen (at which words he pointed at Themistius and Philoponus) who
though they differ almost as much betwixt themselves about the question
we are to consider, as I do from either of them, yet they both agree very
well in this, that there is a determinate number of such ingredients as I was
just now speaking of, and that what that number is, I say not, may be, (for
what may not such as they perswade?) but is wont to be clearly enough
demonstrated both by Reason and Experience. This has occasion’d our
present Conference. For our Discourse this afternoon, having fallen from
one subject to another, and at length setl’d on this, they proffer’d to
demonstrate to me, each of them the truth of his opinion, out of both the
Topicks that I have freshly nam’d. But on the former (that of Reason strictly
so taken) we declin’d insisting at the present, lest we should not have time
enough before supper to go thorough the Reasons and Experiments too. The
latter of which we unanimously thought the most requisite to be seriously
examin’d. I must desire you then to take notice Gentlemen (continued
Carneades) that my present business doth not oblige me so to declare my
own opinion on the Subject in question, as to assert or deny the truth either
of the Peripatetick, or the Chymical Doctrine concerning the number of the
Elements, but only to shew you that neither of these Doctrines hath been
satisfactorily proved by the arguments commonly alledged on its behalfe.
So that if I really discern (as perhaps I think I do) that there may be a more
rational account then ordinary, given of one of these opinions, I am left free
to declare my self of it, notwithstanding my present engagement, it being
obvious to all your observation, that a solid truth may be generally
maintained by no other, then incompetent Arguments. And to this
Declaration I hope it will be needless to add, that my task obliges me not to
answer the Arguments that may be drawn either for Themistius or
Philoponus’s Opinion from the Topick of reason, as opposed to
experiments; since ’tis these only that I am to examine and not all these
neither, but such of them alone as either of them shall think fit to insist on,
and as have hitherto been wont to be brought either to prove that ’tis the
four Peripatetick Elements, or that ’tis the three Chymical Principles that all
compounded bodies consist of. These things (adds Carneades) I thought my

self obliged to premise, partly lest you should do these Gentlemen (pointing
at Themistius and Philoponus, and smiling on them) the injury of measuring
their parts by the arguments they are ready to propose, the lawes of our
Conference confining them to make use of those that the vulgar of
Philosophers (for even of them there is a vulgar) has drawn up to their
hands; and partly, that you should not condemn me of presumption for
disputing against persons over whom I can hope for no advantage, that I
must not derive from the nature, or rules of our controversy, wherein I have
but a negative to defend, and wherein too I am like on several occasions to
have the Assistance of one of my disagreeing adversaries against the other.
Philoponus and Themistius soon returned this complement with civilities of
the like nature, in which Eleutherius perceiving them engaged, to prevent
the further loss of that time of which they were not like to have very much
to spare, he minded them that their present businesse was not to exchange
complements, but Arguments: and then addressing his speech to Carneades,
I esteem it no small happinesse (saies he) that I am come here so luckily
this Evening. For I have been long disquieted with Doubts concerning this
very subject which you are now ready to debate. And since a Question of
this importance is to be now discussed by persons that maintain such
variety of opinions concerning it, and are both so able to enquire after truth,
and so ready to embrace it by whomsoever and on what occasion soever it
is presented them; I cannot but promise my self that I shall before we part
either lose my Doubts or the hopes of ever finding them resolved;
Eleutherius paused not here; but to prevent their answer, added almost in
the same breath; and I am not a little pleased to find that you are resolved
on this occasion to insist rather on Experiments then Syllogismes. For I, and
no doubt You, have long observed, that those Dialectical subtleties, that the
Schoolmen too often employ about Physiological Mysteries, are wont much
more to declare the wit of him that uses them, then increase the knowledge
or remove the doubts of sober lovers of truth. And such captious subtleties
do indeed often puzzle and sometimes silence men, but rarely satisfy them.
Being like the tricks of Jugglers, whereby men doubt not but they are
cheated, though oftentimes they cannot declare by what slights they are
imposed on. And therefore I think you have done very wisely to make it
your businesse to consider the Phænomena relating to the present Question,
which have been afforded by experiments, especially since it might seem

injurious to our senses, by whose mediation we acquire so much of the
knowledge we have of things corporal, to have recourse to far-fetched and
abstracted Ratiocination, to know what are the sensible ingredients of those
sensible things that we daily see and handle, and are supposed to have the
liberty to untwist (if I may so speak) into the primitive bodies they consist
of. He annexed that he wished therefore they would no longer delay his
expected satisfaction, if they had not, as he feared they had, forgotten
something preparatory to their debate; and that was to lay down what
should be all along understood by the word Principle or Element.
Carneades thank’d him for his admonition, but told him that they had not
been unmindful of so requisite a thing. But that being Gentlemen and very
far from the litigious humour of loving to wrangle about words or terms or
notions as empty; they had before his coming in, readily agreed
promiscuously to use when they pleased, Elements and Principles as terms
equivalent: and to understand both by the one and the other, those primitive
and simple Bodies of which the mixt ones are said to be composed, and into
which they are ultimately resolved. And upon the same account (he added)
we agreed to discourse of the opinions to be debated, as we have found
them maintained by the Generality of the assertors of the four Elements of
the one party, and of those that receive the three Principles on the other,
without tying our selves to enquire scrupulously what notion either Aristotle
or Paracelsus, or this or that Interpreter, or follower of either of those great
persons, framed of Elements or Principles; our design being to examine, not
what these or those writers thought or taught, but what we find to be the
obvious and most general opinion of those, who are willing to be accounted
Favourers of the Peripatetick or Chymical Doctrine, concerning this subject.
I see not (saies Eleutherius) why you might not immediately begin to argue,
if you were but agreed which of your two friendly Adversaries shall be first
heard. And it being quickly resolv’d on that Themistius should first propose
the Proofs for his Opinion, because it was the antienter, and the more
general, he made not the company expect long before he thus addressed
himself to Eleutherius, as to the Person least interessed in the dispute.
If you have taken sufficient notice of the late Confession which was made
by Carneades, and which (though his Civility dressed it up in
complementall Expressions) was exacted of him by his Justice, I suppose
You will be easily made sensible, that I engage in this Controversie with

great and peculiar Disadvantages, besides those which his Parts and my
Personal Disabilities would bring to any other cause to be maintained by me
against him. For he justly apprehending the force of truth, though speaking
by no better a tongue then mine, has made it the chief condition of our
Duell, that I should lay aside the best Weapons I have, and those I can best
handle; Whereas if I were allowed the freedom, in pleading for the four
Elements, to employ the Arguments suggested to me by Reason to
demonstrate them, I should almost as little doubt of making You a Proselyte
to those unsever’d Teachers, Truth and Aristotle, as I do of your Candour
and your Judgment. And I hope you will however consider, that that great
Favorite and Interpreter of Nature, Aristotle, who was (as his Organum
witnesses) the greatest Master of Logick that ever liv’d, disclaim’d the
course taken by other petty Philosophers (Antient and Modern) who not
attending the Coherence and Consequences of their Opinions, are more
sollicitous to make each particular Opinion plausible independently upon
the the rest, then to frame them all so, as not only to be consistent together,
but to support each other. For that great Man in his vast and comprehensive
Intellect, so fram’d each of his Notions, that being curiously adapted into
one Systeme, they need not each of them any other defence then that which
their mutuall Coherence gives them: As ’tis in an Arch, where each single
stone, which if sever’d from the rest would be perhaps defenceless, is
sufficiently secur’d by the solidity and entireness of the whole Fabrick of
which it is a part. How justly this may be apply’d to the present case, I
could easily shew You, if I were permitted to declare to You, how
harmonious Aristotles Doctrine of the Elements is with his other Principles
of Philosophy; and how rationally he has deduc’d their number from that of
the combinations of the four first Qualities from the kinds of simple Motion
belonging to simple bodies, and from I know not how many other Principles
and Phænomena of Nature, which so conspire with his Doctrine of the
Elements, that they mutually strengthen and support each other. But since
’tis forbidden me to insist on Reflections of this kind, I must proceed to tell
You, that though the Assertors of the four Elements value Reason so highly,
and are furnish’d with Arguments enough drawn from thence, to be satisfi’d
that there must be four Elements, though no Man had ever yet made any
sensible tryal to discover their Number, yet they are not destitute of
Experience to satisfie others that are wont to be more sway’d by their
senses then their Reason. And I shall proceed to consider the testimony of

Experience, when I shall have first advertis’d You, that if Men were as
perfectly rational as ’tis to be wish’d they were, this sensible way of
Probation would be as needless as ’tis wont to be imperfect. For it is much
more high and Philosophical to discover things a priore, then a posteriore.
And therefore the Peripateticks have not been very sollicitous to gather
Experiments to prove their Doctrines, contenting themselves with a few
only, to satisfie those that are not capable of a Nobler Conviction. And
indeed they employ Experiments rather to illustrate then to demonstrate
their Doctrines, as Astronomers use Sphæres of pastboard, to descend to the
capacities of such as must be taught by their senses, for want of being
arriv’d to a clear apprehension of purely Mathematical Notions and Truths.
I speak thus Eleutherius (adds Themistius) only to do right to Reason, and
not out of Diffidence of the Experimental proof I am to alledge. For though
I shall name but one, yet it is such a one as will make all other appear as
needless as it self will be found Satisfactory. For if You but consider a piece
of green-Wood burning in a Chimney, You will readily discern in the
disbanded parts of it the four Elements, of which we teach It and other mixt
bodies to be compos’d. The fire discovers it self in the flame by its own
light; the smoke by ascending to the top of the chimney, and there readily
vanishing into air, like a River losing it self in the Sea, sufficiently
manifests to what Element it belongs and gladly returnes. The water in its
own form boyling and hissing at the ends of the burning Wood betrayes it
self to more then one of our senses; and the ashes by their weight, their
firiness, and their dryness, put it past doubt that they belong to the Element
of Earth. If I spoke (continues Themistius) to less knowing Persons, I would
perhaps make some Excuse for building upon such an obvious and easie
Analysis, but ’twould be, I fear, injurious, not to think such an Apology
needless to You, who are too judicious either to think it necessary that
Experiments to prove obvious truths should be farr fetch’d, or to wonder
that among so many mixt Bodies that are compounded of the four Elements,
some of them should upon a slight Analysis manifestly exhibite the
Ingredients they consist of. Especially since it is very agreeable to the
Goodness of Nature, to disclose, even in some of the most obvious
Experiments that Men make, a Truth so important, and so requisite to be
taken notice of by them. Besides that our Analysis by how much the more
obvious we make it, by so much the more suittable it will be to the Nature
of that Doctrine which ’tis alledged to prove, which being as clear and

intelligible to the Understanding as obvious to the sense, tis no marvail the
learned part of Mankind should so long and so generally imbrace it. For this
Doctrine is very different from the whimseys of Chymists and other Modern
Innovators, of whose Hypotheses we may observe, as Naturalists do of less
perfect Animals, that as they are hastily form’d, so they are commonly short
liv’d. For so these, as they are often fram’d in one week, are perhaps
thought fit to be laughed at the next; and being built perchance but upon
two or three Experiments are destroyed by a third or fourth, whereas the
doctrine of the four Elements was fram’d by Aristotle after he had leasurely
considered those Theories of former Philosophers, which are now with
great applause revived, as discovered by these latter ages; And had so
judiciously detected and supplyed the Errors and defects of former
Hypotheses concerning the Elements, that his Doctrine of them has been
ever since deservedly embraced by the letter’d part of Mankind: All the
Philosophers that preceded him having in their several ages contributed to
the compleatness of this Doctrine, as those of succeeding times have
acquiesc’d in it. Nor has an Hypothesis so deliberately and maturely
established been called in Question till in the last Century Paracelsus and
some few other sooty Empiricks, rather then (as they are fain to call
themselves) Philosophers, having their eyes darken’d, and their Brains
troubl’d with the smoke of their own Furnaces, began to rail at the
Peripatetick Doctrine, which they were too illiterate to understand, and to
tell the credulous World, that they could see but three Ingredients in mixt
Bodies; which to gain themselves the repute of Inventors, they endeavoured
to disguise by calling them, instead of Earth, and Fire, and Vapour, Salt,
Sulphur, and Mercury; to which they gave the canting title of Hypostatical
Principles: but when they came to describe them, they shewed how little
they understood what they meant by them, by disagreeing as much from
one another, as from the truth they agreed in opposing: For they deliver
their Hypotheses as darkly as their Processes; and ’tis almost as impossible
for any sober Man to find their meaning, as ’tis for them to find their Elixir.
And indeed nothing has spread their Philosophy, but their great Brags and
undertakings; notwithstanding all which, (sayes Themistius smiling) I
scarce know any thing they have performed worth wondering at, save that
they have been able to draw Philoponus to their Party, and to engage him to
the Defence of an unintelligible Hypothesis, who knowes so well as he

does, that Principles ought to be like Diamonds, as well very clear, as
perfectly solid.
Themistius having after these last words declared by his silence, that he had
finished his Discourse, Carneades addressing himself, as his Adversary had
done, to Eleutherius, returned this Answer to it, I hop’d for Demonstration,
but I perceive Themistius hopes to put me off with a Harangue, wherein he
cannot have given me a greater Opinion of his Parts, then he has given me
Distrust for his Hypothesis, since for it even a Man of such Learning can
bring no better Arguments. The Rhetorical part of his Discourse, though it
make not the least part of it, I shall say nothing to, designing to examine
only the Argumentative part, and leaving it to Philoponus to answer those
passages wherein either Paracelsus or Chymists are concern’d: I shall
observe to You, that in what he has said besides, he makes it his Business to
do these two things. The one to propose and make out an Experiment to
demonstrate the common Opinion about the four Elements; And the other,
to insinuate divers things which he thinks may repair the weakness of his
Argument, from Experience, and upon other Accounts bring some credit to
the otherwise defenceless Doctrine he maintains.
To begin then with his Experiment of the burning Wood, it seems to me to
be obnoxious to not a few considerable Exceptions.
And first, if I would now deal rigidly with my Adversary, I might here make
a great Question of the very way of Probation which he and others employ,
without the least scruple, to evince, that the Bodies commonly call’d mixt,
are made up of Earth, Air, Water, and Fire, which they are pleas’d also to
call Elements; namely that upon the suppos’d Analysis made by the fire, of
the former sort of Concretes, there are wont to emerge Bodies resembling
those which they take for the Elements. For not to Anticipate here what I
foresee I shall have occasion to insist on, when I come to discourse with
Philoponus concerning the right that fire has to pass for the proper and
Universal Instrument of Analysing mixt Bodies, not to Anticipate that, I say,
if I were dispos’d to wrangle, I might alledge, that by Themistius his
Experiment it would appear rather that those he calls Elements, are made of
those he calls mixt Bodies, then mix’d Bodies of the Elements. For in
Themistius’s Analyz’d Wood, and in other Bodies dissipated and alter’d by
the fire, it appears, and he confesses, that which he takes for Elementary

Fire and Water, are made out of the Concrete; but it appears not that the
Concrete was made up of Fire and Water. Nor has either He, or any Man,
for ought I know, of his perswasion, yet prov’d that nothing can be obtained
from a Body by the fire that was not Pre-existent in it.
At this unexpected objection, not only Themistius, but the rest of the
company appear’d not a little surpriz’d; but after a while Philoponus
conceiving his opinion, as well as that of Aristotle, concern’d in that
Objection, You cannot sure (sayes he to Carneades) propose this Difficulty;
not to call it Cavill, otherwise then as an Exercise of wit, and not as laying
any weight upon it. For how can that be separated from a thing that was not
existent in it. When, for instance, a Refiner mingles Gold and Lead, and
exposing this Mixture upon a Cuppell to the violence of the fire, thereby
separates it into pure and refulgent Gold and Lead (which driven off
together with the Dross of the Gold is thence call’d Lithargyrium Auri) can
any man doubt that sees these two so differing substances separated from
the Mass, that they were existent in it before it was committed to the fire.
I should (replies Carneades) allow your Argument to prove something, if,
as Men see the Refiners commonly take before hand both Lead and Gold to
make the Mass you speak of, so we did see Nature pull down a parcell of
the Element of Fire, that is fancy’d to be plac’d I know not how many
thousand Leagues off, contiguous to the Orb of the Moon, and to blend it
with a quantity of each of the three other Elements, to compose every mixt
Body, upon whose Resolution the Fire presents us with Fire, and Earth, and
the rest. And let me add, Philoponus, that to make your Reasoning cogent, it
must be first prov’d, that the fire do’s only take the Elementary Ingredients
asunder, without otherwise altering them. For else ’tis obvious, that Bodies
may afford substances which were not pre-existent in them; as Flesh too
long kept produces Magots, and old Cheese Mites, which I suppose you
will not affirm to be Ingredients of those Bodies. Now that fire do’s not
alwayes barely separate the Elementary parts, but sometimes at least alter
also the Ingredients of Bodies, if I did not expect ere long a better occasion
to prove it, I might make probable out of your very Instance, wherein there
is nothing Elementary separated by the great violence of the Refiners fire:
the Gold and Lead which are the two Ingredients separated upon the
Analysis being confessedly yet perfectly mixt Bodies, and the Litharge
being Lead indeed; but such Lead as is differing in consistence and other

Qualities from what it was before. To which I must add that I have
sometimes seen, and so questionlesse have you much oftener, some parcells
of Glasse adhering to the Test or Cuppel, and this Glass though Emergent as
well as the Gold or Litharge upon your Analysis, you will not I hope allow
to have been a third Ingredient of the Mass out of which the fire produc’d it.
Both Philoponus and Themistius were about to reply, when Eleutherius
apprehending that the Prosecution of this Dispute would take up time,
which might be better employ’d, thought fit to prevent them by saying to
Carneades: You made at least half a Promise, when you first propos’d this
Objection, that you would not (now at least) insist on it, nor indeed does it
seem to be of absolute necessity to your cause, that you should. For though
you should grant that there are Elements, it would not follow that there
must be precisely four. And therefore I hope you will proceed to acquaint us
with your other and more considerable Objections against Themistius’s
Opinion, especially since there is so great a Disproportion in Bulke betwixt
the Earth, Water and Air, on the one part, and those little parcells of
resembling substances, that the fire separates from Concretes on the other
part, that I can scarce think that you are serious, when to lose no advantage
against your Adversary, you seem to deny it to be rational, to conclude these
great simple Bodies to be the Elements, and not the Products of
compounded ones.
What you alledge (replies Carneades) of the Vastness of the Earth and
Water, has long since made me willing to allow them to be the greatest and
chief Masses of Matter to be met with here below: But I think I could shew
You, if You would give me leave, that this will prove only that the
Elements, as You call them, are the chief Bodies that make up the
neighbouring part of the World, but not that they are such Ingredients as
every mixt Body must consist of. But since You challenge me of something
of a Promise, though it be not an entire one, Yet I shall willingly perform it.
And indeed I intended not when I first mention’d this Objection, to insist on
it at present against Themistius, (as I plainly intimated in my way of
proposing it:) being only desirous to let you see, that though I discern’d my
Advantages, yet I was willing to forego some of them, rather then appear a
rigid Adversary of a Cause so weak, that it may with safety be favourably
dealt with. But I must here profess, and desire You to take Notice of it, that
though I pass on to another Argument, it is not because I think this first

invalid. For You will find in the Progress of our Dispute, that I had some
reason to question the very way of Probation imploy’d both by Peripateticks
and Chymists, to evince the being and number of the Elements. For that
there are such, and that they are wont to be separated by the Analysis made
by Fire, is indeed taken for granted by both Parties, but has not (for ought I
know) been so much as plausibly attempted to be proved by either. Hoping
then that when we come to that part of our Debate, wherein Considerations
relating to this Matter are to be treated of, you will remember what I have
now said, and that I do rather for a while suppose, then absolutely grant the
truth of what I have question’d, I will proceed to another Objection.
And hereupon Eleutherius having promis’d him not to be unmindfull, when
time should serve, of what he had declar’d.
I consider then (sayes Carneades) in the next place, that there are divers
Bodies out of which Themistius will not prove in haste, that there can be so
many Elements as four extracted by the Fire. And I should perchance
trouble him if I should ask him what Peripatetick can shew us, (I say not, all
the four Elements, for that would be too rigid a Question, but) any one of
them extracted out of Gold by any degree of Fire whatsoever. Nor is Gold
the only Bodie in Nature that would puzzle an Aristotelian, that is no more
to analyze by the Fire into Elementary Bodies, since, for ought I have yet
observ’d, both Silver and calcin’d Venetian Talck, and some other
Concretes, not necessary here to be nam’d, are so fixt, that to reduce any of
them into four Heterogeneous Substances has hitherto prov’d a Task much
too hard, not only for the Disciples of Aristotle, but those of Vulcan, at least,
whilst the latter have employ’d only Fire to make the Analysis.
The next Argument (continues Carneades) that I shall urge against
Themistius’s Opinion shall be this, That as there are divers Bodies whose
Analysis by Fire cannot reduce them into so many Heterogeneous
Substances or Ingregredients as four, so there are others which may be
reduc’d into more, as the Blood (and divers other parts) of Men and other
Animals, which yield when analyz’d five distinct Substances, Phlegme,
Spirit, Oyle, Salt and Earth, as Experience has shewn us in distilling Mans
Blood, Harts-Horns, and divers other Bodies that belonging to the Animal-
Kingdom abound with not uneasily sequestrable Salt.

THE

SCEPTICAL CHYMIST:

OR

CHYMICO-PHYSICAL

Doubts & Paradoxes,
Touching the

EXPERIMENTS
WHEREBY

V U L G A R S PA G Y R I S T S
Are wont to Endeavour to Evince their

S A LT , S U L P H U R
AND

MERCURY,
TO BE

The True Principles of Things.

Utinam jam tenerentur omnia, & inoperta ac confessa
Veritas esset! Nihil ex Decretis mutaremus. Nunc
Veritatem cum eis qui docent, quærimus. Sen.

LONDON,

Printed for J. Crooke, and are to be sold at the
Ship in St. Pauls Church-Yard. 1661.

THE

SCEPTICAL CHYMIST.

The First Part.

I Am (sayes Carneades) so unwilling to deny Eleutherius any thing, that
though, before the rest of the Company I am resolv’d to make good the
part I have undertaken of a Sceptick; yet I shall readily, since you will have
it so, lay aside for a while the Person of an Adversary to the Peripateticks
and Chymists; and before I acquaint you with my Objections against their
Opinions, acknowledge to you what may be (whether truly or not)
tollerably enough added, in favour of a certain number of Principles of mixt
Bodies, to that grand and known Argument from the Analysis of compound
Bodies, which I may possibly hereafter be able to confute.
And that you may the more easily Examine, and the better Judge of what I
have to say, I shall cast it into a pretty number of distinct Propositions, to
which I shall not premise any thing; because I take it for granted, that you
need not be advertis’d, that much of what I am to deliver, whether for or
against a determinate number of Ingredients of mix’d Bodies, may be
indifferently apply’d to the four Peripatetick Elements, and the three
Chymical Principles, though divers of my Objections will more peculiarly
belong to these last nam’d, because the Chymical Hypothesis seeming to be
much more countenanc’d by Experience then the other, it will be expedient
to insist chiefly upon the disproving of that; especially since most of the
Arguments that are imploy’d against it, may, by a little variation, be made
to conclude, at least as strongly against the less plausible, Aristotelian
Doctrine.
To proceed then to my Propositions, I shall begin with this. That
Propos. I.It seems not absurd to conceive that at the first Production of
mixt Bodies, the Universal Matter whereof they among other Parts of
the Universe consisted, was actually divided into little Particles of
several sizes and shapes variously mov’d.

This (sayes Carneades) I suppose you will easily enough allow. For besides
that which happens in the Generation, Corruption, Nutrition, and wasting of
Bodies, that which we discover partly by our Microscopes of the extream
littlenesse of even the scarce sensible parts of Concretes; and partly by the
Chymical Resolutions of mixt Bodies, and by divers other Operations of
Spagyrical Fires upon them, seems sufficiently to manifest their consisting
of parts very minute and of differing Figures. And that there does also
intervene a various local Motion of such small Bodies, will scarce be
denied; whether we chuse to grant the Origine of Concretions assign’d by
Epicurus, or that related by Moses. For the first, as you well know, supposes
not only all mixt Bodies, but all others to be produc’d by the various and
casual occursions of Atomes, moving themselves to and fro by an internal
Principle in the Immense or rather Infinite Vacuum. And as for the inspir’d
Historian, He, informing us that the great and Wise Author of Things did
not immediately create Plants, Beasts, Birds, &c. but produc’d them out of
those portions of the pre-existent, though created, Matter, that he calls
Water and Earth, allows us to conceive, that the constituent Particles
whereof these new Concretes were to consist, were variously moved in
order to their being connected into the Bodies they were, by their various
Coalitions and Textures, to compose.
But (continues Carneades) presuming that the first Proposition needs not be
longer insisted on, I will pass on to the second, and tell you that
Propos. II.Neither is it impossible that of these minute Particles divers of
the smallest and neighbouring ones were here and there associated
into minute Masses or Clusters, and did by their Coalitions constitute
great store of such little primary Concretions or Masses as were not
easily dissipable into such Particles as compos’d them.
To what may be deduc’d, in favour of this Assertion, from the Nature of the
Thing it self, I will add something out of Experience, which though I have
not known it used to such a purpose, seems to me more fairly to make out
that there May be Elementary Bodies, then the more questionable
Experiments of Peripateticks and Chymists prove that there Are such. I
consider then that Gold will mix and be colliquated not only with Silver,
Copper, Tin and Lead, but with Antimony, Regulus Martis and many other
Minerals, with which it will compose Bodies very differing both from Gold,

and the other Ingredients of the resulting Concretes. And the same Gold will
also by common Aqua Regis, and (I speak it knowingly) by divers other
Menstruums be reduc’d into a seeming Liquor, in so much that the
Corpuscles of Gold will, with those of the Menstruum, pass through Cap-
Paper, and with them also coagulate into a Crystalline Salt. And I have
further try’d, that with a small quantity of a certain Saline Substance I
prepar’d, I can easily enough sublime Gold into the form of red Crystalls of
a considerable length; and many other wayes may Gold be disguis’d, and
help to constitute Bodies of very differing Natures both from It and from
one another, and neverthelesse be afterward reduc’d to the self-same
Numerical, Yellow, Fixt, Ponderous and Malleable Gold it was before its
commixture. Nor is it only the fixedst of Metals, but the most fugitive, that I
may employ in favour of our Proposition: for Quicksilver will with divers
Metals compose an Amalgam, with divers Menstruums it seems to be turn’d
into a Liquor, with Aqua fortis will be brought into either a red or white
Powder or precipitate, with Oyl of Vitriol into a pale Yellow one, with
Sulphur it will compose a blood-red and volatile Cinaber, with some Saline
Bodies it will ascend in form of a Salt which will be dissoluble in water;
with Regulus of Antimony and Silver I have seen it sublim’d into a kinde of
Crystals, with another Mixture I reduc’d it into a malleable Body, into a
hard and brittle Substance by another: And some there are who affirm, that
by proper Additaments they can reduce Quicksilver into Oyl, nay into
Glass, to mention no more. And yet out of all these exotick Compounds, we
may recover the very same running Mercury that was the main Ingredient
of them, and was so disguis’d in them. Now the Reason (proceeds
Carneades) that I have represented these things concerning Gold and
Quicksilver, is, That it may not appear absurd to conceive, that such little
primary Masses or Clusters, as our Proposition mentions, may remain
undissipated, notwithstanding their entring into the composition of various
Concretions, since the Corpuscle of Gold and Mercury, though they be not
primary Concretions of the most minute Particles or matter, but confessedly
mixt Bodies, are able to concurre plentifully to the composition of several
very differing Bodies, without losing their own Nature or Texture, or having
their cohæsion violated by the divorce of their associated parts or
Ingredients.

Give me leave to add (sayes Eleutherius) on this occasion, to what you now
observ’d, that as confidently as some Chymists, and other modern
Innovators in Philosophy are wont to object against the Peripateticks, That
from the mixture of their four Elements there could arise but an
inconsiderable variety of compound Bodies; yet if the Aristotelians were
but half as well vers’d in the works of Nature as they are in the Writings of
their Master, the propos’d Objection would not so calmly triumph, as for
want of Experiments they are fain to suffer it to do. For if we assigne to the
Corpuscles, whereof each Element consists, a peculiar size and shape, it
may easily enough be manifested, That such differingly figur’d Corpuscles
may be mingled in such various Proportions, and may be connected so
many several wayes, that an almost incredible number of variously
qualified Concretes may be compos’d of them. Especially since the
Corpuscles of one Element may barely, by being associated among
themselves, make up little Masses of differing size and figure from their
constituent parts: and since also to the strict union of such minute Bodies
there seems oftentimes nothing requisite, besides the bare Contact of a great
part of their Surfaces. And how great a variety of Phænomena the same
matter, without the addition of any other, and only several ways dispos’d or
contexed, is able to exhibit, may partly appear by the multitude of differing
Engins which by the contrivances of skilful Mechanitians, and the dexterity
of expert Workmen, may be made of Iron alone. But in our present case
being allow’d to deduce compound Bodies from four very differently
qualified sorts of matter, he who shall but consider what you freshly took
notice of concerning the new Concretes resulting from the mixture of
incorporated Minerals, will scarce doubt but that the four Elements
mannag’d by Natures Skill may afford a multitude of differing Compounds.
I am thus far of your minde (sayes Carneades) that the Aristotelians might
with probability deduce a much greater number of compound Bodies from
the mixture of their four Elements, than according to their present
Hypothesis they can, if instead of vainly attempting to deduce the variety
and properties of all mixt Bodies from the Combinations and Temperaments
of the four Elements, as they are (among them) endowd with the four first
Qualities, they had endeavoured to do it by the Bulk and Figure of the
smallest parts of those supposed Elements. For from these more Catholick
and Fruitfull Accidents of the Elementary matter may spring a great variety

of Textures, upon whose Account a multitude of compound Bodies may
very much differ from one another. And what I now observe touching the
four Peripatetick Elements, may be also applyed, mutatis mutandis, (as they
speak) to the Chymical Principles. But (to take notice of that by the by)
both the one and the other, must, I fear, call in to their assistance something
that is not Elementary, to excite or regulate the motion of the parts of the
matter, and dispose them after the manner requisite to the Constitution of
particular Concretes. For that otherwise they are like to give us but a very
imperfect account of the Origine of very many mixt Bodies, It would, I
think, be no hard matter to perswade you, if it would not spend time, and
were no Digression, to examine, what they are wont to alledge of the
Origine of the Textures and Qualities of mixt Bodies, from a certain
substantial Form, whose Origination they leave more obscure than what it is
assum’d to explicate.
But to proceed to a new Proposition.
Propos. III.I shall not peremptorily deny, that from most of such mixt
Bodies as partake either of Animal or Vegetable Nature, there may by
the Help of the Fire, be actually obtain’d a determinate number
(whether Three, Four or Five, or fewer or more) of Substances, worthy
of differing Denominations.
Of the Experiments that induce me to make this Concession, I am like to
have occasion enough to mention several in the prosecution of my
Discourse. And therefore, that I may not hereafter be oblig’d to trouble You
and my self with needless Repetitions, I shall now only desire you to take
notice of such Experiments, when they shall be mention’d, and in your
thoughts referre them hither.
To these three Concessions I have but this Fourth to add, That
Propos. IV.It
may likewise be granted, that those distinct Substances,
which Concretes generally either afford or are made up of, may
without very much Inconvenience be call’d the Elements or Principles
of them.
When I said, without very much Inconvenience, I had in my Thoughts that
sober Admonition of Galen, Cum de re constat, de verbis non est

Litigandum. And therefore also I scruple not to say Elements or Principles,
partly because the Chymists are wont to call the Ingredients of mixt Bodies,
Principles, as the Aristotelians name them Elements; I would here exclude
neither. And, partly, because it seems doubtfull whether the same
Ingredients may not be call’d Principles? as not being compounded of any
more primary Bodies: and Elements, in regard that all mix’d Bodies are
compounded of them. But I thought it requisite to limit my Concession by
premising the words, very much, to the word Inconvenience, because that
though the Inconvenience of calling the distinct Substances, mention’d in
the Proposition Elements or Principles, be not very great, yet that it is an
Impropriety of Speech, and consequently in a matter of this moment not to
be altogether overlook’d, You will perhaps think, as well as I, by that time
you shall have heard the following part of my Discourse, by which you will
best discern what Construction to put upon the former Propositions, and
how far they may be look’d upon, as things that I concede as true, and how
far as things I only represent as specious enough to be fit to be consider’d.
And now Eleutherius (continues Carneades) I must resume the person of a
Sceptick, and as such, propose some part of what may be either dislik’t, or
at least doubted of in the common Hypothesis of the Chymists: which if I
examine with a little the more freedom, I hope I need not desire you (a
Person to whom I have the Happinesse of being so well known) to look
upon it as something more suitable to the Employment whereto the
Company has, for this Meeting, doom’d me; then either to my Humour or
my Custom.
Now though I might present you many things against the Vulgar Chymical
Opinion of the three Principles, and the Experiments wont to be alledg’d as
Demonstrations of it, yet those I shall at present offer you may be
conveniently enough comprehended in four Capital Considerations;
touching all which I shall only premise this in general, That since it is not
my present Task so much to assert an Hypothesis of my own, as to give an
Account wherefore I suspect the Truth of that of the Chymists, it ought not
to be expected that all my Objections should be of the most cogent sort,
since it is reason enough to Doubt of a propos’d Opinion, that there appears
no cogent Reason for it.

To come then to the Objections themselves; I consider in the first place,
That notwithstanding what common Chymists have prov’d or taught, it may
reasonably enough be Doubted, how far, and in what sence, Fire ought to be
esteem’d the genuine and universal Instrument of analyzing mixt Bodies.
This Doubt, you may remember, was formerly mention’d, but so transiently
discours’d of, that it will now be fit to insist upon it; And manifest that it
was not so inconsiderately propos’d as our Adversaries then imagin’d.
But, before I enter any farther into this Disquisition, I cannot but here take
notice, that it were to be wish’d, our Chymists had clearly inform’d us what
kinde of Division of Bodies by Fire must determine the number of the
Elements: For it is nothing near so easy as many seem to think, to determine
distinctly the Effects of Heat, as I could easily manifest, if I had leasure to
shew you how much the Operations of Fire may be diversify’d by
Circumstances. But not wholly to pass by a matter of this Importance, I will
first take notice to you, that Guajacum (for Instance) burnt with an open
Fire in a Chimney, is sequestred into Ashes and Soot, whereas the same
Wood distill’d in a Retort does yield far other Heterogeneities, (to use the
Helmontian expression) and is resolv’d into Oyl, Spirit, Vinager, Water and
Charcoal; the last of which to be reduc’d into Ashes, requires the being
farther calcin’d then it can be in a close Vessel: Besides having kindled
Amber, and held a clean Silver Spoon, or some other Concave and smooth
Vessel over the Smoak of its Flame, I observ’d the Soot into which that
Fume condens’d, to be very differing from any thing that I had observ’d to
proceed from the steam of Amber purposely (for that is not usual) distilled
per se in close Vessels. Thus having, for Tryals sake, kindled Camphire, and
catcht the Smoak that copiously ascended out of the Flame, it condens’d
into a Black and unctuous Soot, which would not have been guess’d by the
Smell or other Properties to have proceeded from Camphire: whereas
having (as I shall otherwhere more fully declare) expos’d a quantity of that
Fugitive Concrete to a gentle heat in a close Glass-Vessel, it sublim’d up
without seeming to have lost any thing of its whiteness, or its Nature, both
which it retain’d, though afterwards I so encreased the Fire as to bring it to
Fusion. And, besides Camphire, there are divers other Bodies (that I
elsewhere name) in which the heat in close Vessels is not wont to make any
separation of Heterogeneities, but only a comminution of Parts, those that
rise first being Homogeneal with the others, though subdivided into smaller

Particles: whence Sublimations have been stiled, The Pestles of the
Chymists. But not here to mention what I elsewhere take notice of,
concerning common Brimstone once or twice sublim’d, that expos’d to a
moderate Fire in Subliming-Pots, it rises all into dry, and almost tastless,
Flowers; Whereas being expos’d to a naked Fire it affords store of a Saline
and Fretting Liquor: Not to mention this, I say, I will further observe to you,
that as it is considerable in the Analysis of mixt Bodies, whether the Fire act
on them when they are expos’d to the open Air, or shut up in close Vessels,
so is the degree of Fire by which the Analysis is attempted of no small
moment. For a milde Balneum will sever unfermented Blood (for Instance)
but into Phlegme and Caput mortuum, the later whereof (which I have
sometimes had) hard, brittle, and of divers Colours, (transparent almost like
Tortoise-shell) press’d by a good Fire in a Retort yields a Spirit, an Oyl or
two, and a volatile Salt, besides a Caput mortuum. It may be also pertinent
to our present Designe, to take notice of what happens in the making and
distilling of Sope; for by one degree of Fire the Salt, the Water and the Oyl
or Grease, whereof that factitious Concrete is made up, being boyl’d up
together are easily brought to mingle and incorporate into one Mass; but by
another and further degree of Heat the same Mass may be again divided
into an oleagenous, an aqueous, a Saline, and an Earthy part. And so we
may observe that impure Silver and Lead being expos’d together to a
moderate Fire, will thereby be colliquated into one Mass, and mingle per
minima, as they speak, whereas a much vehementer Fire will drive or carry
off the baser Metals (I mean the Lead, and the Copper or other Alloy) from
the Silver, though not, for ought appears, separate them from one another.
Besides, when a Vegetable abounding in fixt Salt is analyz’d by a naked
Fire, as one degree of Heat will reduce it into Ashes, (as the Chymists
themselves teach us) so, by only a further degree of Fire, those Ashes may
be vitrified and turn’d into Glass. I will not stay to examine how far a meere
Chymist might on this occasion demand, If it be lawful for an Aristotelian
to make Ashes, (which he mistakes for meere Earth) pass for an Element,
because by one degree of Fire it may be produc’d, why a Chymist may not
upon the like Principle argue, that Glass is one of the Elements of many
Bodies, because that also may be obtain’d from them, barely by the Fire? I
will not, I say, lose time to examine this, but observe, that by a Method of
applying the Fire, such similar Bodies may be obtain’d from a Concrete, as
Chymists have not been able to separate; either by barely burning it in an

open Fire, or by barely distilling it in close Vessels. For to me it seems very
considerable, and I wonder that men have taken so little notice of it, that I
have not by any of the common wayes of Distillation in close Vessels, seen
any separation made of such a volatile Salt as is afforded us by Wood, when
that is first by an open Fire divided into Ashes and Soot, and that Soot is
afterwards plac’d in a strong Retort, and compell’d by an urgent Fire to part
with its Spirit, Oyl and Salt; for though I dare not peremptorily deny, that in
the Liquors of Guajacum and other Woods distill’d in Retorts after the
common manner, there may be Saline parts, which by reason of the
Analogy may pretend to the name of some kinde of volatile Salts; yet
questionless there is a great disparity betwixt such Salts and that which we
have sometimes obtain’d upon the first Distillation of Soot (though for the
most part it has not been separated from the first or second Rectification,
and sometimes not till the third) For we could never yet see separated from
Woods analyz’d only the vulgar way in close vessels any volatile Salt in a
dry and Saline form, as that of Soot, which we have often had very
Crystalline and Geometrically figur’d. And then, whereas the Saline parts of
the Spirits of Guajacum, &c. appear upon distillation sluggish enough, the
Salt of Soot seems to be one of the most volatile Bodies in all Nature; and if
it be well made will readily ascend with the milde heat of a Furnace,
warm’d only by the single Wieck of a Lamp, to the top of the highest Glass
Vessels that are commonly made use of for Distillation: and besides all this,
the taste and smell of the Salt of Soot are exceeding differing from those of
the Spirits of Guajacum, &c. and the former not only smells and tastes
much less like a vegetable Salt, than like that of Harts-horn, and other
Animal Concretes; but in divers other Properties seems more of Kinne to
the Family of Animals, than to that of vegetable Salts, as I may elsewhere
(God permitting) have an occasion more particularly to declare. I might
likewise by some other Examples manifest, That the Chymists, to have
dealt clearly, ought to have more explicitly and particularly declar’d by
what Degree of Fire, and in what manner of Application of it, they would
have us Judge a Division made by the Fire to be a true Analysis into their
Principles, and the Productions of it to deserve the name of Elementary
Bodies. But it is time that I proceed to mention the particular Reasons that
incline me to Doubt, whether the Fire be the true and universal Analyzer of
mixt Bodies; of which Reasons what has been already objected may pass
for one.

In the next place I observe, That there are some mixt Bodies from which it
has not been yet made appear, that any degree of Fire can separate either
Salt or Sulphur or Mercury, much less all the Three. The most obvious
Instance of this Truth is Gold, which is a Body so fix’d, and wherein the
Elementary Ingredients (if it have any) are so firmly united to each other,
that we finde not in the operations wherein Gold is expos’d to the Fire, how
violent soever, that it does discernably so much as lose of its fixednesse or
weight, so far is it from being dissipated into those Principles, whereof one
at least is acknowledged to be Fugitive enough; and so justly did the
Spagyricall Poet somewhere exclaim,
Cuncta adeo miris illic compagibus harent.
And I must not omit on this occasion to mention to you, Eleutherius, the
memorable Experiment that I remember I met with in Gasto Claveus Gasto
Claveus Apolog. Argur. & Chrysopera., who, though a Lawyer by Profession, seems
to have had no small Curiosity and Experience in Chymical affairs: He
relates then, that having put into one small Earthen Vessel an Ounce of the
most pure Gold, and into another the like weight of pure Silver, he plac’d
them both in that part of a Glass-house Furnace wherein the Workmen keep
their Metal, (as our English Artificers call their Liquid Glass) continually
melted, and that having there kept both the Gold and the Silver in constant
Fusion for two Moneths together, he afterwards took them out of the
Furnace and the Vessels, and weighing both of them again, found that the
Silver had not lost above a 12th part of its weight, but the Gold had not of
his lost any thing at all. And though our Author endeavours to give us of
this a Scholastick Reason, which I suppose you would be as little satisfied
with, as I was when I read it; yet for the matter of Fact, which will serve our
present turne, he assures us, that though it be strange, yet Experience it self
taught it him to be most true.
And though there be not perhaps any other Body to be found so perfectly
fix’d as Gold, yet there are divers others so fix’d or compos’d, at least of so
strictly united parts, that I have not yet observ’d the Fire to separate from
them any one of the Chymists Principles. I need not tell you what
Complaints the more Candid and Judicious of the Chymists themselves are
wont to make of those Boasters that confidently pretend, that they have
extracted the Salt or Sulphur of Quicksilver, when they have disguis’d it by

Additaments, wherewith it resembles the Concretes whose Names are given
it; whereas by a skilful and rigid Examen, it may be easily enough stript of
its Disguises, and made to appear again in the pristine form of running
Mercury. The pretended Salts and Sulphurs being so far from being
Elementary parts extracted out of the Bodie of Mercurie, that they are rather
(to borrow a terme of the Grammarians) De-compound Bodies, made up of
the whole Metal and the Menstruum or other Additaments imploy’d to
disguise it. And as for Silver, I never could see any degree of Fire make it
part with any of its three Principles. And though the Experiment lately
mentioned from Claveus may beget a Suspition that Silver may be
dissipated by Fire, provided it be extreamly violent and very lasting: yet it
will not necessarily follow, that because the Fire was able at length to make
the Silver lose a little of its weight, it was therefore able to dissipate it into
its Principles. For first I might alledge that I have observ’d little Grains of
Silver to lie hid in the small Cavities (perhaps glas’d over by a vitrifying
heat) in Crucibles, wherein Silver has been long kept in Fusion, whence
some Goldsmiths of my Acquaintance make a Benefit by grinding such
Crucibles to powder, to recover out of them the latent particles of Silver.
And hence I might argue, that perhaps Claveus was mistaken, and imagin’d
that Silver to have been driven away by the Fire, that indeed lay in minute
parts hid in his Crucible, in whose pores so small a quantity as he mist of so
ponderous a Bodie might very well lie conceal’d.
But Secondly, admitting that some parts of the Silver were driven away by
the violence of the Fire, what proof is there that it was either the Salt, the
Sulphur, or the Mercury of the Metal, and not rather a part of it
homogeneous to what remain’d? For besides, that the Silver that was left
seem’d not sensibly alter’d, which probably would have appear’d, had so
much of any one of its Principles been separated from it: We finde in other
Mineral Bodies of a less permanent nature than Silver, that the Fire may
divide them into such minute parts, as to be able to carry them away with its
self, without at all destroying their Nature. Thus we see that in the refining
of Silver, the Lead that is mix’d with it (to carry away the Copper or other
ignoble Mineral that embases the Silver) will, if it be let alone, in time
evaporate away upon the Test; but if (as is most usual amongst those that
refine great quantities of Metals together) the Lead be blown off from the
Silver by Bellowes, that which would else have gone away in the Form of

unheeded steams, will in great part be collected not far from the Silver, in
the Form of a darkish Powder or Calx, which, because it is blown off from
Silver, they call Litharge of Silver. And thus Agricola Agricola de Natura Fossil.
Lib. 9. Cap. 11. & 12. in divers places informs us, when Copper, or the Oare of it
is colliquated by the violence of the Fire with Cadmia, the Sparks that in
great multitudes do fly upwards do, some of them, stick to the vaulted
Roofs of the Furnaces, in the form of little and (for the most part) White
Bubbles, which therefore the Greeks, and, in Imitation of them, our
Drugsters call Pompholix: and others more heavy partly adhere to the sides
of the Furnace, and partly (especially if the Covers be not kept upon the
Pots) fall to the Ground, and by reason of their Ashy Colour as well as
Weight were called by the same Greeks σποδος, which, I need not tell you,
in their Language signifies Ashes. I might add, that I have not found that
from Venetian Talck (I say Venetian, because I have found other kinds of
that Mineral more open) from the Lapis Ossifragus, (which the Shops call
Ostiocolla) from Muscovia Glass, from pure and Fusible Sand, to mention
now no other Concretes; those of my Acquaintance that have try’d have
been able by the Fire to separate any one of the Hypostatical Principles,
which you will the less scruple to believe, if you consider that Glass may be
made by the bare Colliquation of the Salt and Earth remaining in the Ashes
of a burnt Plant, and that yet common Glass, once made, does so far resist
the violence of the Fire, that most Chymists think it a Body more
undestroyable then Gold it self. For if the Artificer can so firmly unite such
comparative gross Particles as those of Earth and Salt that make up
common Ashes, into a Body indissoluble by Fire; why may not Nature
associate in divers Bodies the more minute Elementary Corpuscles she has
at hand too firmly to let them be separable by the Fire? And on this
Occasion, Eleutherius, give me leave to mention to you two or three sleight
Experiments, which will, I hope, be found more pertinent to our present
Discourse, than at first perhaps they will appear. The first is, that, having
(for Tryals sake) put a quantity of that Fugitive Concrete, Camphire, into a
Glass Vessel, and plac’d it in a gentle Heat, I found it (not leaving behinde,
according to my Estimate, not so much as one Grain) to sublime to the Top
of the Vessel into Flowers: which in Whiteness, Smell, &c. seem’d not to
differ from the Camphire it self. Another Experiment is that of Helmont,
who in several places affirms, That a Coal kept in a Glass exactly clos’d
will never be calcin’d to Ashes, though kept never so long in a strong Fire.

To countenance which I shall tell you this Tryal of my own, That having
sometimes distilled some Woods, as particularly Box, whilst our Caput
mortuum remain’d in the Retort, it continued black like Charcoal, though
the Retort were Earthen, and kept red-hot in a vehement Fire; but as soon as
ever it was brought out of the candent Vessel into the open Air, the burning
Coals did hastily degenerate or fall asunder, without the Assistance of any
new Calcination, into pure white Ashes. And to these two I shall add but
this obvious and known Observation, that common Sulphur (if it be pure
and freed from its Vinager) being leasurely sublim’d in close Vessels, rises
into dry Flowers, which may be presently melted into a Bodie of the same
Nature with that which afforded them. Though if Brimstone be burnt in the
open Air it gives, you know, a penetrating Fume, which being caught in a
Glass-Bell condenses into that acid Liquor called Oyl of Sulphur per
Campanam. The use I would make of these Experiments collated with what
I lately told you out of Agricola is this, That even among the Bodies that are
not fixt, there are divers of such a Texture, that it will be hard to make it
appear, how the Fire, as Chymists are wont to imploy it, can resolve them
into Elementary Substances. For some Bodies being of such a Texture that
the Fire can drive them into the cooler and less hot part of the Vessels
wherein they are included, and if need be, remove them from place to place
to fly the greatest heat, more easily than it can divorce their Elements
(especially without the Assistance of the Air) we see that our Chymists
cannot Analyze them in close Vessels, and of other compound Bodies the
open Fire can as little separate the Elements. For what can a naked Fire do
to Analyze a mixt Bodie, if its component Principles be so minute, and so
strictly united, that the Corpuscles of it need less heat to carry them up, than
is requisite to divide them into their Principles. So that of some Bodies the
Fire cannot in close Vessels make any Analysis at all, and others will in the
open Air fly away in the Forms of Flowers or Liquors, before the Heat can
prove able to divide them into their Principles. And this may hold, whether
the various similar parts of a Concrete be combin’d by Nature or by Art;
For in factitious Sal Armoniack we finde the common and the Urinous Salts
so well mingled, that both in the open Fire, and in subliming Vessels they
rise together as one Salt, which seems in such Vessels irresoluble by Fire
alone. For I can shew you Sal Armoniack which after the ninth Sublimation
does still retain its compounded Nature. And indeed I scarce know any one
Mineral, from which by Fire alone Chymists are wont to sever any

Substance simple enough to deserve the name of an Element or Principle.
For though out of native Cinnaber they distill Quicksilver, and though from
many of those Stones that the Ancients called Pyrites they sublime
Brimstone, yet both that Quicksilver and this Sulphur being very often the
same with the common Minerals that are sold in the Shops under those
names, are themselves too much compounded Bodies to pass for the
Elements of such. And thus much, Eleutherius, for the Second Argument
that belongs to my First Consideration; the others I shall the lesse insist on,
because I have dwelt so long upon this.
Proceed we then in the next place to consider, That there are divers
Separations to be made by other means, which either cannot at all, or else
cannot so well be made by the Fire alone. When Gold and Silver are melted
into one Mass, it would lay a great Obligation upon Refiners and
Goldsmiths to teach them the Art of separating them by the Fire, without
the trouble and charge they are fain to be at to sever them. Whereas they
may be very easily parted by the Affusion of Spirit of Nitre or Aqua fortis
(which the French therefore call Eau de Depart:) so likewise the Metalline
part of Vitriol will not be so easily and conveniently separated from the
Saline part even by a violent Fire, as by the Affusion of certain Alkalizate
Salts in a liquid Form upon the Solution of Vitriol made in common water.
For thereby the acid Salt of the Vitriol, leaving the Copper it had corroded
to joyn with the added Salts, the Metalline part will be precipitated to the
bottom almost like Mud. And that I may not give Instances only in De-
compound Bodies, I will add a not useless one of another kinde. Not only
Chymists have not been able (for ought is vulgarly known) by Fire alone to
separate true Sulphur from Antimony; but though you may finde in their
Books many plausible Processes of Extracting it, yet he that shall make as
many fruitlesse Tryals as I have done to obtain it by, most of them will, I
suppose, be easily perswaded, that the Productions of such Processes are
Antimonial Sulphurs rather in Name than Nature. But though Antimony
sublim’d by its self is reduc’d but to a volatile Powder, or Antimonial
Flowers, of a compounded Nature like the Mineral that affords them: yet I
remember that some years ago I sublim’d out of Antimony a Sulphur, and
that in greater plenty then ever I saw obtain’d from that Mineral, by a
Method which I shall therefore acquaint you with, because Chymists seem
not to have taken notice of what Importance such Experiments may be in

the Indagation of the Nature, and especially of the Number of the Elements.
Having then purposely for Tryals sake digested eight Ounces of good and
well powder’d Antimony with twelve Ounces of Oyl of Vitriol in a well
stopt Glas-Vessel for about six or seven Weeks; and having caus’d the Mass
(grown hard and brittle) to be distill’d in a Retort plac’d in Sand, with a
strong Fire; we found the Antimony to be so opened, or alter’d by the
Menstruum wherewith it had been digested, That whereas crude Antimony,
forc’d up by the Fire, arises only in Flowers, our Antimony thus handled
afforded us partly in the Receiver, and partly in the Neck and at the Top of
the Retort, about an Ounce of Sulphur, yellow and brittle like common
Brimstone, and of so Sulphureous a smell, that upon the unluting the
Vessels it infected the Room with a scarce supportable stink. And this
Sulphur, besides the Colour and Smell, had the perfect Inflamability of
common Brimstone, and would immediately kindle (at the Flame of a
Candle) and burn blew like it. And though it seem’d that the long digestion
wherein our Antimony and Menstruum were detain’d, did conduce to the
better unlocking of the Mineral, yet if you have not the leasure to make so
long a Digestion, you may by incorporating with powder’d Antimony a
convenient Quantity of Oyl of Vitriol, and committing them immediately to
Distillation, obtain a little Sulphur like unto the common one, and more
combustible than perhaps you will at first take notice of. For I have
observ’d, that though (after its being first kindled) the Flame would
sometimes go out too soon of its self, if the same Lump of Sulphur were
held again to the Flame of a Candle, it would be rekindled and burn a pretty
while, not only after the second, but after the third or fourth accension. You,
to whom I think I shewed my way of discovering something of Sulphureous
in Oyl of Vitriol, may perchance suspect, Eleutherius, either that this
Substance was some Venereal Sulphur that lay hid in that Liquor, and was
by this operation only reduc’d into a manifest Body; or else that it was a
compound of the unctuous parts of the Antimony, and the Saline ones of the
Vitriol, in regard that (as Gunther Lib. 1. Observat. Cap. 6. informs us) divers
learned men would have Sulphur to be nothing but a mixture made in the
Bowels of the Earth of Vitriolate Spirits and a certain combustible
Substance. But the Quantity of Sulphur we obtain’d by Digestion was much
too great to have been latent in the Oyl of Vitriol. And that Vitriolate Spirits
are not necessary to the Constitution of such a Sulphur as ours, I could
easily manifest, if I would acquaint you with the several wayes by which I

have obtain’d, though not in such plenty, a Sulphur of Antimony, colour’d
and combustible like common Brimstone. And though I am not now minded
to discover them, yet I shall tell you, that to satisfie some Ingenious Men,
that distill’d Vitriolate Spirits are not necessary to the obtaining of such a
Sulphur as we have been considering, I did by the bare distillation of only
Spirit of Nitre, from its weight of crude Antimony separate, in a short time,
a yellow and very inflamable Sulphur, which, for ought I know, deserves as
much the name of an Element, as any thing that Chymists are wont to
separate from any Mineral by the Fire. I could perhaps tell you of other
Operations upon Antimony, whereby That may be extracted from it, which
cannot be forc’d out of it by the Fire; but I shall reserve them for a fitter
Opportunity, and only annex at present this sleight, but not impertinent
Experiment. That whereas I lately observed to you, that the Urinous and
common Salts whereof Sal Armoniack consists, remain’d unsever’d by the
Fire in many successive Sublimations, they may be easily separated, and
partly without any Fire at all, by pouring upon the Concrete finely
powder’d, a Solution of Salt of Tartar, or of the Salt of Wood-Ashes; for
upon your diligently mixing of these you will finde your Nose invaded with
a very strong smell of Urine, and perhaps too your Eyes forc’d to water by
the same subtle and piercing Body that produces the stink; both these
effects proceeding from hence, that by the Alcalizate Salt, the Sea Salt that
enter’d the composition of the Sal Armoniack is mortify’d and made more
fixt, and thereby a divorce is made between it and the volatile Urinous Salt,
which being at once set at liberty, and put into motion, begins presently to
fly away, and to offend the Nostrils and Eyes it meets with by the way. And
if the operation of these Salts be in convenient Glasses promoted by
warmth, though but by that of a Bath, the ascending Steams may easily be
caught and reduc’d into a penetrant Spirit, abounding with a Salt, which I
have sometimes found to be separable in a Crystalline Form. I might add to
these Instances, that whereas Sublimate, consisting, as you know, of Salts &
Quicksilver combin’d and carried up together by Heat, may be Sublim’d, I
know not how often, by a like degree of Fire, without suffering any divorce
of the component Bodies, the Mercury may be easily sever’d from the
adhering Salts, if the Sublimate be distill’d from Salt of Tartar, Quick Lime,
or such Alcalizate Bodies. But I will rather observe to you, Eleutherius,
what divers ingenious men have thought somewhat strange; that by such an
Additament that seems but only to promote the Separation, there may be

easily obtain’d from a Concrete that by the Fire alone is easily divisible into
all the Elements that Vegetables are suppos’d to consist of, such a similar
Substance as differs in many respects from them all, and consequently has
by many of the most Intelligent Chymists been denied to be contain’d in the
mixt Body. For I know a way, and have practis’d it, whereby common
Tartar, without the addition of any thing that is not perfectly a Mineral
except Salt-petre, may by one Distillation in an Earthen Retort be made to
afford good store of real Salt, readily dissoluble in water, which I found to
be neither acid, nor of the smell of Tartar, and to be almost as volatile as
Spirit of Wine it self, and to be indeed of so differing a Nature from all that
is wont to be separated by Fire from Tartar, that divers Learned Men, with
whom I discours’d of it, could hardly be brought to beleeve, that so fugitive
a Salt could be afforded by Tartar, till I assur’d it them upon my own
Knowledge. And if I did not think you apt to suspect me to be rather too
backward than too forward to credit or affirm unlikely things, I could
convince you by what I have yet lying by me of that anomalous Salt.
The Fourth thing that I shall alledge to countenance my first Consideration
is, That the Fire even when it divides a Body into Substances of divers
Consistences, does not most commonly analyze it into Hypostatical
Principles, but only disposes its parts into new Textures, and thereby
produces Concretes of a new indeed, but yet of a compound Nature. This
Argument it will be requisite for me to prosecute so fully hereafter, that I
hope you will then confess that ’tis not for want of good Proofs that I desire
leave to suspend my Proofs till the Series of my Discourse shall make it
more proper and seasonable to propose them.
It may be further alledg’d on the behalf of my First Consideration, That
some such distinct Substances may be obtain’d from some Concretes
without Fire, as deserve no less the name of Elementary, than many that
Chymists extort by the Violence of the Fire.
We see that the Inflamable Spirit, or as the Chymists esteem it, the Sulphur
of Wine, may not only be separated from it by the gentle heat of a Bath, but
may be distill’d either by the help of the Sun-Beams, or even of a Dunghill,
being indeed of so Fugitive a Nature, that it is not easy to keep it from
flying away, even without the Application of external heat. I have likewise
observ’d that a Vessel full of Urine being plac’d in a Dunghill, the

Putrefaction is wont after some weeks so to open the Body, that the parts
disbanding the Saline Spirit, will within no very long time, if the Vessel be
not stopt, fly away of it self; Insomuch that from such Urine I have been
able to distill little or nothing else than a nauseous Phlegme, instead of the
active and piercing Salt and Spirit that it would have afforded, when first
expos’d to the Fire, if the Vessel had been carefully stopt.
And this leads me to consider in the Fifth place, That it will be very hard to
prove, that there can no other Body or way be given which will as well as
the Fire divide Concretes into several homogeneous Substances, which may
consequently be call’d their Elements or Principles, as well as those
separated or produc’d by the Fire. For since we have lately seen, that Nature
can successefully employ other Instruments than the Fire to separate
distinct Substances from mixt Bodies, how know we, but that Nature has
made, or Art may make, some such Substance as may be a fit Instrument to
Analyze mixt Bodies, or that some such Method may be found by Humane
Industry or Luck, by whose means compound Bodies may be resolv’d into
other Substances, than such as they are wont to be divided into by the Fire.
And why the Products of such an Analysis may not as justly be call’d the
component Principles of the Bodies that afford them, it will not be easy to
shew, especially since I shall hereafter make it evident, that the Substances
which Chymists are wont to call the Salts, and Sulphurs, and Mercuries of
Bodies, are not so pure and Elementary as they presume, and as their
Hypothesis requires. And this may therefore be the more freely press’d
upon the Chymists, because neither the Paracelsians, nor the Helmontians
can reject it without apparent Injury to their respective Masters. For
Helmont do’s more than once Inform his Readers, that both Paracelsus and
Himself were Possessors of the famous Liquor, Alkahest, which for its great
power in resolving Bodies irresoluble by Vulgar Fires, he somewhere seems
to call Ignis Gehennæ. To this Liquor he ascribes, (and that in great part
upon his own Experience) such wonders, that if we suppose them all true, I
am so much the more a Friend to Knowledge than to Wealth, that I should
think the Alkahest a nobler and more desireable Secret than the
Philosophers Stone it self. Of this Universal Dissolvent he relates, That
having digested with it for a competent time a piece of Oaken Charcoal, it
was thereby reduc’d into a couple of new and distinct Liquors,
discriminated from each other by their Colour and Situation, and that the

whole body of the Coal was reduc’d into those Liquors, both of them
separable from his Immortal Menstruum, which remain’d as fit for such
Operations as before. And he moreover tells us in divers places of his
Writings, that by this powerful, and unwearied Agent, he could dissolve
Metals, Marchasites, Stones, Vegetable and Animal Bodies of what kinde
soever, and even Glass it self (first reduc’d to powder,) and in a word, all
kinds of mixt Bodies in the World into their several similar Substances,
without any Residence or Caput mortuum. And lastly, we may gather this
further from his Informations, That the homogeneous Substances obtainable
from compound Bodies by his piercing Liquor, were oftentimes different
enough both as to Number and as to Nature, from those into which the same
Bodies are wont to be divided by common Fire. Of which I shall need in
this place to mention no other proof, then that whereas we know that in our
common Analysis of a mixt Body, there remains a terrestrial and very fixt
Substance, oftentimes associated with a Salt as fixt; Our Author tells us,
that by his way he could Distill over all Concretes without any Caput
mortuum, and consequently could make those parts of the Concrete volatile,
which in the Vulgar Analysis would have been fixt. So that if our Chymists
will not reject the solemn and repeated Testimony of a Person, who cannot
but be acknowledg’d for one of the greatest Spagyrists that they can boast
of, they must not deny that there is to be found in Nature another Agent able
to Analyze compound Bodies less violently, and both more genuinely and
more universally than the Fire. And for my own part, though I cannot but
say on this Occasion what (you know) our Friend Mr. Boyle is wont to say,
when he is askt his Opinion of any strange Experiment; That He that hath
seen it hath more Reason to beleeve it, than He that hath not; yet I have
found Helmont so faithful a Writer, even in divers of his improbable
Experiments (I alwayes except that Extravagant Treatise De Magnetica
Vulnerum Curatione, which some of his Friends affirm to have been first
publish’d by his Enemies) that I think it somewhat harsh to give him the
Lye, especially to what he delivers upon his own proper Tryal. And I have
heard from very credible Eye-witnesses some things, and seen some others
my self, which argue so strongly, that a circulated Salt, or a Menstruum
(such as it may be) may by being abstracted from compound Bodies,
whether Mineral, Animal, or Vegetable, leave them more unlockt than a
wary Naturalist would easily beleeve, that I dare not confidently measure
the Power of Nature and Art by that of the Menstruums, and other

Instruments that eminent Chymists themselves are as yet wont to Empoly
about the Analyzing of Bodies; nor Deny that a Menstruum may at least
from this or that particular Concrete obtain some apparently similar
Substance, differing from any obtainable from the same Body by any
degree or manner of Application of the Fire. And I am the more backward
to deny peremptorily, that there may be such Openers of compound Bodies,
because among the Experiments that make me speak thus warily, there
wanted not some in which it appear’d not, that one of the Substances not
separable by common Fires and Menstruums could retain any thing of the
Salt by which the separation was made.
And here, Eleutherius, (sayes Carneades) I should conclude as much of my
Discourse as belongs to the first Consideration I propos’d, but that I
foresee, that what I have delivered will appear liable to two such specious
Objections, that I cannot safely proceed any further till I have examin’d
them.
And first, one sort of Opposers will be forward to tell me, That they do not
pretend by Fire alone to separate out of all compound Bodies their
Hypostatical Principles; it being sufficient that the Fire divides them into
such, though afterwards they employ other Bodies to collect the similar
parts of the Compound; as ’tis known, that though they make use of water
to collect the Saline parts of Ashes from the Terrestrial wherewith they are
blended, yet it is the Fire only that Incinerates Bodies, and reduces the fix’d
part of them into the Salt and Earth, whereof Ashes are made up. This
Objection is not, I confess, inconsiderable, and I might in great part allow
of it, without granting it to make against me, if I would content my self to
answer, that it is not against those that make it that I have been disputing,
but against those Vulgar Chymists, who themselves believe, and would fain
make others do so, That the Fire is not only an universal, but an adæquate
and sufficient Instrument to analyze mixt Bodies with. For as to their
Practice of Extracting the fix’d Salt out of Ashes by the Affusion of Water,
’tis obvious to alleadge, that the Water does only assemble together the Salt
the Fire had before divided from the Earth: as a Sieve does not further break
the Corn, but only bring together into two distinct heaps the Flour and the
Bran, whose Corpuscles before lay promiscuously blended together in the
Meal. This I say I might alleadge, and thereby exempt my self from the
need of taking any farther notice of the propos’d Objection. But not to lose

the Rise it may afford me of Illustrating the matter under Consideration, I
am content briefly to consider it, as far forth as my present Disquisition
may be concern’d in it.
Not to repeat then what has been already answer’d, I say farther, that
though I am so civil an Adversary, that I will allow the Chymists, after the
Fire has done all its work, the use of fair Water to make their Extractions
with, in such cases wherein the Water does not cooperate with the Fire to
make the Analysis; yet since I Grant this but upon Supposition that the
Water does only wash off the Saline Particles, which the Fire Alone has
Before Extricated in the Analyz’d Body, it will not be Reasonable, that this
Concession should Extend to other Liquors that may Add to what they
Dissolve, nor so much as to other Cases than those Newly Mentioned:
Which Limitation I Desire You would be Pleas’d to Bear in Mind till I shall
Anon have Occasion to make Use of it. And This being thus Premis’d, I
shall Proceed to Observe,
First, That Many of the Instances I Propos’d in the Preceding Discourse are
Such, that the Objection we are Considering will not at all Reach Them. For
Fire can no more with the Assistance of Water than without it Separate any
of the Three Principles, either from Gold, Silver, Mercury, or some Others
of the Concretes named Above.
Hence We may Inferre, That Fire is not an Universal Analyzer of all Mixt
Bodies, since of Metals and Minerals, wherein Chymists have most
Exercis’d Themselves, there Appear scarce Any which they are able to
Analyze by Fire, Nay, from which they can Unquestionably Separate so
much as any One of their Hypostatical Principles; Which may well Appear
no small Disparagement as well to their Hypothesis as to their Pretensions.
It will also remain True, notwithstanding the Objection, That there may be
Other Wayes than the wonted Analysis by Fire, to Separate from a
Compound Body Substances as Homogeneneous as those that Chymists
Scruple not to Reckon among their Tria Prima (as some of them, for
Brevity Sake, call their Three Principles.)
And it Appears, That by Convenient Additaments such Substances may be
Separated by the Help of the Fire, as could not be so by the Fire alone:
Witness the Sulphur of Antimony.

And Lastly, I must Represent, That since it appears too that the Fire is but
One of the Instruments that must be Employ’d in the Resolution of Bodies,
We may Reasonably Challenge the Liberty of doing Two Things. For when
ever any Menstruum or other Additament is Employ’d, together with the
Fire to Obtain a Sulphur or a Salt from a Body, We may well take the
Freedom to Examine, whether or no That Menstruum do barely Help to
Separate the Principle Obtain’d by It, or whether there Intervene not a
Coalition of the Parts of the Body Wrought upon with Those of the
Menstruum, whereby the Produc’d Concrete may be Judg’d to Result from
the Union of Both. And it will be farther Allowable for Us to Consider, how
far any Substance, Separated by the Help of such Additaments, Ought to
pass for one of the Tria Prima; since by One Way of Handling the same
Mixt Body it may according to the Nature of the Additaments, and the
Method of Working upon it, be made to Afford differing Substances from
those Obtainable from it by other Additaments, and another Method, nay
and (as may appear by what I Formerly told You about Tartar) Differing
from any of the Substances into which a Concrete is Divisible by the Fire
without Additaments, though perhaps those Additaments do not, as
Ingredients, enter the Composition of the Obtained Body, but only
Diversify the Operation of the Fire upon the Concrete; and though that
Concrete by the Fire alone may be Divided into a Number of Differing
Substances, as Great as any of the Chymists that I have met with teach us
that of the Elements to be. And having said thus much (sayes Carneades) to
the Objection likely to be Propos’d by some Chymists, I am now to
Examine that which I Foresee will be Confidently press’d by Divers
Peripateticks, who, to Prove Fire to be the true Analyzer of Bodies, will
Plead, That it is the very Definition of Heat given by Aristotle, and
Generally Received, Congregare Homogenea, & Heterogenea Segregare, to
Assemble Things of a Resembling, and Disjoyn those of a Differing Nature.
To this I answer, That this Effect is far from being so Essential to Heat, as
’tis Generally Imagin’d; for it rather Seems, that the True and Genuine
Property of Heat is, to set a Moving, and thereby to Dissociate the parts of
Bodies, and Subdivide them into Minute Particles, without regard to their
being Homogeneous or Heterogeneous, as is apparent in the Boyling of
Water, the Distillation of Quicksilver, or the Exposing of Bodies to the
action of the Fire, whose Parts either Are not (at least in that Degree of Heat
Appear not) Dissimilar, where all that the Fire can do, is to Divide the Body

into very Minute Parts which are of the same Nature with one another, and
with their Totum, as their Reduction by Condensation Evinces. And even
when the Fire seems most so Congregare Homogenea, & Segregare
Heterogenea, it Produces that Effect but by Accident; For the Fire does but
Dissolve the Cement, or rather Shatter the Frame, or [tructure that kept the
Heterogeneous Parts of Bodies together, under one Common Form; upon
which Dissolution the Component Particles of the Mixt, being Freed and set
at Liberty, do Naturally, and oftentimes without any Operation of the Fire,
Associate themselves each with its Like, or rather do take those places
which their Several Degrees of Gravity and Levity, Fixedness or Volatility
(either Natural, or Adventitious from the Impression of the Fire) Assigne
them. Thus in the Distillation (for Instance) of Man’s Blood, the Fire do’s
First begin to Dissolve the Nexus or Cement of the Body; and then the
Water, being the most Volatile, and Easy to be Extracted, is either by the
Igneous Atomes, or the Agitation they are put into by the Fire, first carried
up, till Forsaken by what carried it up, its Weight sinks it down into the
Receiver: but all this while the other Principles of the Concrete Remain
Unsever’d, and Require a stronger Degree of Heat to make a Separation of
its more Fixt Elements; and therefore the Fire must be Increas’d which
Carries over the Volatile Salt and the Spirit, they being, though Beleev’d to
be Differing Principles, and though Really of Different Consistency, yet of
an almost Equal Volatility. After them, as less Fugitive, comes over the Oyl,
and leaves behinde the Earth and the Alcali, which being of an Equal
Fixednesse, the Fire Severs them not, for all the Definition of the Schools.
And if into a Red-hot Earthen or Iron Retort you cast the Matter to be
Distill’d, You may Observe, as I have often done, that the Predominant Fire
will Carry up all the Volatile Elements Confusedly in one Fume, which will
afterwards take their Places in the Receiver, either according to the Degree
of their Gravity, or according to the Exigency of their respective Textures;
the Salt Adhering, for the most part, to the Sides and Top, and the Phlegme
Fastening it self there too in great Drops, the Oyle and Spirit placing
themselves Under, or Above one another, according as their Ponderousness
makes them Swim or Sink. For ’tis Observable, that though Oyl or Liquid
Sulphur be one of the Elements Separated by this Fiery Analysis, yet the
Heat which Accidentally Unites the Particles of the other Volatile
Principles, has not alwayes the same Operation on this, there being divers
Bodies which Yield Two Oyls, whereof the One sinks to the Bottom of that

Spirit on which the other Swims; as I can shew You in some Oyls of the
same Deers Blood, which are yet by Me: Nay I can shew you Two Oyls
carefully made of the same Parcel of Humane Blood, which not only Differ
extreamly in Colour, but Swim upon one another without Mixture, and if by
Agitation Confounded will of themselves Divorce again.
And that the Fire doth oftentimes divide Bodies, upon the account that some
of their Parts are more Fixt, and some more Volatile, how far soever either
of these Two may be from a pure Elementary Nature is Obvious enough, if
Men would but heed it in the Burning of Wood, which the Fire Dissipates
into Smoake and Ashes: For not only the latter of these is Confessedly made
up of two such Differing Bodies as Earth and Salt; but the Former being
condens’d into that Soot which adheres to our Chimneys, Discovers it self
to Contain both Salt and Oyl, and Spirit and Earth, (and some Portion of
Phlegme too) which being, all almost, Equally Volatile to that Degree of
Fire which Forces them up, (the more Volatile Parts Helping perhaps, as
well as the Urgency of the Fire, to carry up the more Fixt ones, as I have
often Try’d in Dulcify’d Colcothar, Sublim’d by Sal Armoniack Blended
with it) are carried Up together, but may afterwards be Separated by other
Degrees of Fire, whose orderly Gradation allowes the Disparity of their
Volatileness to Discover it self. Besides, if Differing Bodies United into one
Mass be both sufficiently Fixt, the Fire finding no Parts Volatile enough to
be Expell’d or carried up, makes no Separation at all; as may appear by a
Mixture of Colliquated Silver and Gold, whose Component Metals may be
easily Sever’d by Aqua Fortis, or Aqua Regis (according to the
Predominancy of the Silver or the Gold) but in the Fire alone, though
vehement, the Metals remain unsever’d, the Fire only dividing the Body
into smaller Particles (whose Littlenesse may be argu’d from their Fluidity)
in which either the little nimble Atoms of Fire, or its brisk and numberless
strokes upon the Vessels, hinder Rest and Continuity, without any
Sequestration of Elementary Principles. Moreover, the Fire sometimes does
not Separate, so much as Unite, Bodies of a differing Nature; provided they
be of an almost resembling Fixedness, and have in the Figure of their Parts
an Aptness to Coalition, as we see in the making of many Plaisters,
Oyntments, &c. And in such Metalline Mixtures as that made by Melting
together two parts of clean Brass with one of pure Copper, of which some
Ingenious Trades-men cast such curious Patterns (for Gold and Silver

Works) as I have sometimes taken great Pleasure to Look upon. Sometimes
the Bodies mingled by the Fire are Differing enough as to Fixidity and
Volatility, and yet are so combin’d by the first Operation of the Fire, that it
self does scarce afterwards Separate them, but only Pulverize them;
whereof an Instance is afforded us by the Common Preparation of
Mercurius Dulcis, where the Saline Particles of the Vitriol, Sea Salt, and
sometimes Nitre, Employ’d to make the Sublimate, do so unite themselves
with the Mercurial Particles made use of, first to Make Sublimate, and then
to Dulcifie it, that the Saline and Metalline Parts arise together in many
successive Sublimations, as if they all made but one Body. And sometimes
too the Fire does not only not Sever the Differing Elements of a Body, but
Combine them so firmly, that Nature her self does very seldom, if ever,
make Unions less Dissoluble. For the Fire meeting with some Bodies
exceedingly and almost equally Fixt, instead of making a Separation, makes
an Union so strict, that it self, alone, is unable to Dissolve it; As we see,
when an Alcalizate Salt and the Terrestrial Residue of the Ashes are
Incorporated with pure Sand, and by Vitrification made one permanent
Body, (I mean the course or greenish sort of Glass) that mocks the greatest
Violence of the Fire, which though able to Marry the Ingredients of it, yet is
not able to Divorce them. I can shew you some pieces of Glass which I saw
flow down from an Earthen Crucible purposely Expos’d for a good while,
with Silver in it, to a very vehement Fire. And some that deal much in the
Fusion of Metals Informe me, that the melting of a great part of a Crucible
into Glass is no great Wonder in their Furnaces. I remember, I have
Observ’d too in the Melting of great Quantities of Iron out of the Oar, by
the Help of store of Charcoal (for they Affirm that Sea-Coal will not yield a
Flame strong enough) that by the prodigious Vehemence of the Fire,
Excited by vast Bellows (made to play by great Wheels turn’d about by
Water) part of the Materials Expos’d to it was, instead of being Analyz’d,
Colliquated, and turn’d into a Dark, Solid and very Ponderous Glass, and
that in such Quantity, that in some places I have seen the very High-wayes,
neer such Iron-works, mended with Heaps of such Lumps of Glasse, instead
of Stones and Gravel. And I have also Observ’d, that some kind of Fire-
stone it Self, having been employ’d in Furnaces wherein it was expos’d to
very strong and lasting Fires, has had all its Fixt Parts so Wrought on by the
Fire, as to be Perfectly Vitrifi’d, which I have try’d by Forcing from it
Pretty large Pieces of Perfect and Transparent Glass. And lest You might

think, Eleutherius, that the Question’d Definition of Heat may be
Demonstrated, by the Definition which is wont to be given and Acquiesc’d
in, of its contrary Quality, Cold, whose property is taught to be tam
Homogenea, quam Heterogenea congregare; Give me leave to represent to
You, that neither is this Definition unquestionable; for not to Mention the
Exceptions, which a Logician, as such, may Take at it, I Consider that the
Union of Heterogeneous Bodies which is Suppos’d to be the Genuine
Production of Cold, is not Perform’d by every Degree of Cold. For we see
for Instance that in the Urine of Healthy Men, when the Liquor has been
Suffer’d a while to stand, the Cold makes a Separation of the Thinner Part
from the Grosser, which Subsides to the Bottom, and Growes Opacous
there; whereas if the Urinal be Warme, these Parts readily Mingle again,
and the whole Liquor becomes Transparent as before. And when, by
Glaciation, Wood, Straw, Dust, Water, &c. are Suppos’d to be United into
one Lump of Ice, the Cold does not Cause any Real Union or Adunation, (if
I may so Speak) of these Bodies, but only Hardening the Aqueous Parts of
the Liquor into Ice, the other Bodies being Accidentally Present in that
Liquor are frozen up in it, but not Really United. And accordingly if we
Expose a Heap of Mony Consisting of Gold, Silver and Copper Coynes, or
any other Bodies of Differing Natures, which are Destitute of Aqueous
Moisture, Capable of Congelation, to never so intense a Cold, we find not
that these Differing Bodies are at all thereby so much as Compacted, much
less United together; and even in Liquors Themselves we find Phænomena
which Induce us to Question the Definition which we are examining. If
Paracelsus his Authority were to be look’t upon as a Sufficient Proof in
matters of this Nature, I might here insist on that Process of his, whereby he
Teaches that the Essence of Wine may be Sever’d from the Phlegme and
Ignoble Part by the Assistance of Congelation: and because much Weight
has been laid upon this Process, not only by Paracelsians, but other Writers,
some of whom seem not to have perus’d it themselves, I shall give You the
entire Passage in the Authors own Words, as I lately found them in the sixth
Book of his Archidoxis, an Extract whereof I have yet about me; and it
sounds thus. De Vino sciendum est, fæcem phlegmaque ejus esse Mineram,
& Vini substantiam esse corpus in quo conservatur Essentia, prout auri in
auro latet Essentia. Juxta quod Practicam nobis ad Memoriam ponimus, ut
non obliviscamur, ad hunc modum: Recipe Vinum vetustissimum & optimum
quod habere poteris, calore saporeque ad placitum, hoc in vas vitreum

infundas ut tertiam ejus partem impleat, & sigillo Hermetis occlusum in
equino ventre mensibus quatuor, & in continuato calore teneatur qui non
deficiat. Quo peracto, Hyeme cum frigus & gelu maxime sæviunt, his per
mensem exponatur ut congeletur. Ad hunc modum frigus vini spiritum una
cum ejus substantia protrudit in vini centrum, ac separat a phlegmate:
Congelatum abjice, quod vero congelatum non est, id Spiritum cum
substantia esse judicato. Hunc in Pelicanum positum in arenæ digestione
non adeo calida per aliquod tempus manere finito; Postmodum eximito vini
Magisterium, de quo locuti sumus.
But I dare not Eleu. lay much Weight upon this Process, because I have
found that if it were True, it would be but seldom Practicable in this
Country upon the best Wine: for Though this present Winter hath been
Extraordinary Cold, yet in very Keen Frosts accompanied with lasting
Snowes, I have not been able in any Measure to Freeze a thin Vial full of
Sack; and even with Snow and Salt I could Freeze little more then the
Surface of it; and I suppose Eleu. that tis not every Degree of Cold that is
Capable of Congealing Liquors, which is able to make such an Analysis (if I
may so call it) of them by Separating their Aqueous and Spirituous Parts;
for I have sometimes, though not often, frozen severally, Red-wine, Urine
and Milk, but could not Observe the expected Separation. And the Dutch-
Men that were forc’d to Winter in that Icie Region neer the Artick Circle,
call’d Nova Zembla, although they relate, as we shall see below, that there
was a Separation of Parts made in their frozen Beer about the middle of
November, yet of the Freezing of their Back in December following they
give but this Account: Yea and our Sack, which is so hot, was Frozen very
hard, so that when we were every Man to have his part, we were forc’d to
melt it in the Fire; which we shar’d every second Day, about half a Pinte
for a Man, wherewith we were forc’d to sustain our selves. In which words
they imply not, that their Back was divided by the Frost into differing
Substances, after such manner as their Beer had been. All which
notwithstanding, Eleu. suppose that it may be made to appear, that even
Cold sometimes may Congregare Homogenea, & Heterogenea Segregare:
and to Manifest this I may tell you, that I did once, purposely cause to be
Decocted in fair Water a Plant abounding with Sulphureous and Spirituous
Parts, and having expos’d the Decoction to a keen North-Wind in a very
Frosty Night, I observ’d, that the more Aqueous Parts of it were turn’d by

the next Morning into Ice, towards the innermost part of which, the more
Agile and Spirituous parts, as I then conjectur’d, having Retreated, to shun
as much as might be their Environing Enemy, they had there preserv’d
themselves unfrozen in the Form of a high colour’d Liquor, the Aqueous
and Spirituous parts having been so sleightly (Blended rather than) United
in the Decoction, that they were easily Separable by such a Degree of Cold
as would not have been able to have Divorc’d the Parts of Urine or Wine,
which by Fermentation or Digestion are wont, as Tryal has inform’d me, to
be more intimately associated each with other. But I have already intimated,
Eleutherius, that I shall not Insist on this Experiment, not only because,
having made it but once I may possibly have been mistaken in it; but also
(and that principally) because of that much more full and eminent
Experiment of the Separative Virtue of extream Cold, that was made,
against their Wills, by the foremention’d Dutch men that Winter’d in Nova
Zembla; the Relation of whose Voyage being a very scarce Book, it will not
be amiss to give you that Memorable part of it which concerns our present
Theme, as I caus’d the Passage to be extracted out of the Englished Voyage
it self.
“Gerard de Veer, John Cornelyson and Others, sent out of Amsterdam,
Anno Dom. 1596. being forc’d by unseasonable Weather to Winter in Nova
Zembla, neer Ice-Haven; on the thirteenth of October, Three of us (sayes
the Relation) went aboard the Ship, and laded a Sled with Beer; but when
we had laden it, thinking to go to our House with it, suddenly there arose
such a Winde, and so great a Storm and Cold, that we were forc’d to go into
the Ship again, because we were not able to stay without; and we could not
get the Beer into the Ship again, but were forc’d to let it stand without upon
the Sled: the Fourteenth, as we came out of the Ship, we found the Barrel of
Beer standing upon the Sled, but it was fast frozen at the Heads; yet by
reason of the great Cold, the Beer that purg’d out froze as hard upon the
Side of the Barrel, as if it had been glu’d thereon: and in that sort we drew it
to our House, and set the Barrel an end, and drank it up; but first we were
forc’d to melt the Beer, for there was scarce any unfrozen Beer in the barrel;
but in that thick Yiest that was unfrozen lay the Strength of the Beer, so that
it was too strong to drink alone, and that which was frozen tasted like
Water; and being melted we Mix’d one with the other, and so drank it; but it
had neither Strength nor Taste.”

And on this Occasion I remember, that having the last very Sharp Winter
purposely try’d to Freeze, among other Liquors, some Beer moderately
strong, in Glass Vessels, with Snow and Salt, I observ’d, that there came out
of the Neck a certain thick Substance, which, it seems, was much better
able then the rest of the Liquor (that I found turn’d into Ice) to resist a Frost,
and which, by its Colour and consistence seem’d mafestly enough to be
Yiest, whereat, I confess, I somewhat marvail’d, because I did not either
discerne by the Taste, or find by Enquiry, that the Beer was at all too New
to be very fit to be Drank. I might confirm the Dutchmens Relation, by
what happen’d a while since to a neere Friend of mine, who complained to
me, that having Brew’d some Beer or Ale for his own drinking in Holland
(where he then dwelt) the Keenness of the late bitter Winter froze the Drink
so as to reduce it into Ice, and a small Proportion of a very Strong and
Spirituous Liquor. But I must not entertain you any longer concerning Cold,
not onely because you may think I have but lost my way into a Theme
which does not directly belong to my present Undertaking; but because I
have already enlarg’d my self too much upon the first Consideration I
propos’d, though it appears so much a Paradox, that it seem’d to Require
that I should say much to keep it from being thought a meere Extravagance;
yet since I Undertook but to make the common Assumption of our
Chymists and Aristotelians appear Questionable, I hope I have so Perform’d
that Task, that I may now Proceed to my Following Considerations, and
Insist lesse on them than I have done on the First.

THE

SCEPTICAL CHYMIST.

The Second Part.

T He Second Consideration I Desire to have Notice Taken of, is This,
That it is not so Sure, as Both Chymists and Aristotelians are wont to
Think it, that every Seemingly Similar or Distinct Substance that is
Separated from a Body by the Help of the Fire, was Pre existent in it as a
Principle or Element of it.
That I may not make this Paradox a Greater then I needs must, I will First
Briefly Explain what the Proposition means, before I proceed to Argue for
it.
And I suppose You will easily Believe That I do not mean that any thing is
separable from a Body by Fire, that was not Materially pre-existent in it; for
it Far Exceeds the power of Meerly Naturall Agents, and Consequently of
the Fire, to produce anew, so Much as one Atome of Matter, which they can
but Modifie and Alter, not Create; which is so Obvious a Truth, that almost
all Sects of Philosophers have Deny’d the Power of producing Matter to
Second Causes; and the Epicureans and some Others have Done the Like,
in Reference to their Gods themselves.
Nor does the Proposition peremptorily Deny but that some Things Obtain’d
by the Fire from a Mixt Body, may have been more then barely Materially
pre-existent in it, since there are Concretes, which before they be Expos’d
to the Fire afford us several Documents of their abounding, some with Salt,
and Others with Sulphur. For it will serve the present Turn, if it appear that
diverse things Obtain’d from a Mixt Body expos’d to the Fire, were not its
Ingredients Before: for if this be made to appear it, will be Rationall enough
to suspect that Chymists may Decieve themselves, and Others, in
concluding Resolutely and Universally, those Substances to be the
Elementary Ingredients of Bodies barely separated by the Fire, of which it
yet may be Doubted Whether there be such or No; at least till some other

Argument then that drawn from the Analysis be Brought to resolve the
Doubt.
That then which I Mean by the Proposition I am Explaining, is, That it may
without Absurdity be Doubted whether or no the Differing Substances
Obtainable from a Concrete Dissipated by the Fire were so Exsistent in it in
that Forme (at least as to their minute Parts) wherein we find them when the
Analysis is over, that the Fire did only Dis-joyne and Extricate the
Corpuscles of one Principle from those of the other wherewith before they
were Blended.
Having thus Explain’d my Proposition, I shall endeavour to do two things,
to prove it; The first of which is to shew that such Substances as Chymists
call Principles May be produc’d De novo (as they speak.) And the other is
to make it probable that by the Fire we may Actually obtain from some
Mixt Bodies such Substances as were not in the Newly Expounded sence,
pre-existent in them.
To begin then with the First of these, I Consider that if it be as true as ’tis
probable, that Compounded Bodies Differ from One Another but in the
Various Textures Resulting from the Bigness, Shape, Motion, and
contrivance of their smal parts, It will not be Irrationall to conceive that one
and the same parcel of the Universal Matter may by Various Alterations and
Contextures be brought to Deserve the Name, somtimes of a Sulphureous,
and sometimes of a Terrene, or Aqueous Body. And this I could more
largely Explicate, but that our Friend Mr. Boyle has promis’d us something
about Qualities, wherein the Theme I now willingly Resign him, Will I
Question not be Studiously Enquired into. Wherefore what I shall now
advance in favour of what I have lately Deliver’d shall be Deduc’d from
Experiments made Divers Years since. The first of which would have been
much more considerable, but that by some intervening Accidents I was
Necessitated to lose the best time of the year, for a trial of the Nature of that
I design’d; it being about he middle of May before I was able to begin an
Experiment which should have then been two moneths old; but such as it
was, it will not perhaps be impertinent to Give You this Narrative of it. At
the time newly Mention’d, I caus’d My Gardiner (being by Urgent
Occasions Hinder’d from being present myself) to dig out a convenient
quantity of good Earth, and dry it well in an Oven, to weigh it, to put it in

an Earthen pot almost level with the Surface of the ground, and to set in it a
selected seed he had before received from me, for that purpose, of Squash,
which is an Indian kind of Pompion, that Growes apace; this seed I Ordered
Him to Water only with Rain or Spring Water. I did not (when my
Occasions permitted me to visit it) without delight behold how fast it Grew,
though unseasonably sown; but the Hastning Winter Hinder’d it from
attaining any thing neer its due and Wonted magnitude; (for I found the
same Autumn, in my Garden, some of those plants, by Measure, as big
about as my Middle) and made me order the having it taken Up; Which
about the Middle of October was carefully Done by the same Gardiner, who
a while after sent me this account of it; I have Weighed the Pompion with
the Stalk and Leaves, all which Weighed three pound wanting a quarter;
Then I took the Earth, baked it as formerly, and found it just as much as I
did at First, which made me think I had not dry’d it Sufficiently: then I put it
into the Oven twice More, after the Bread was Drawn, and Weighed it the
Second time, but found it Shrink little or nothing.
But to deal Candidly with You, Eleutherius, I must not conceal from You
the Event of another Experiment of this Kind made this present Summer,
wherein the Earth seems to have been much more Wasted; as may appear by
the following account, Lately sent me by the same Gardiner, in these
Words. To give You an Account of your Cucumbers, I have Gain’d two
Indifferent Fair Ones, the Weight of them is ten Pound and a Halfe, the
Branches with the Roots Weighed four Pounds wanting two Ounces; and
when I had weighed them I took the Earth, and bak’d it in several small
Earthen Dishes in an Oven; and when I had so done, I found the Earth
wanted a Pound and a halfe of what it was formerly; yet I was not satisfi’d,
doubting the Earth was not dry: I put it into an Oven the Second Time,
(after the Bread was drawn) and after I had taken it out and weighed it, I
found it to be the Same Weight: So I Suppose there was no Moisture left in
the Earth. Neither do I think that the Pound and Halfe that was wanting
was Drawn away by the Cucumber but a great Part of it in the Ordering
was in Dust (and the like) wasted: (the Cucumbers are kept by themselves,
lest You should send for them.) But yet in this Tryal, Eleutherius, it appears
that though some of the Earth, or rather the dissoluble Salt harbour’d in it,
were wasted, the main Body of the Plant consisted of Transmuted Water.
And I might add, that a year after I caus’d the formerly mentioned

Experiment, touching large Pompions, to be reiterated, with so good
success, that if my memory does not much mis-inform me, it did not only
much surpass any that I made before, but seem’d strangely to conclude
what I am pleading for; though (by reason I have unhappily lost the
particular Account my Gardiner writ me up of the Circumstances) I dare not
insist upon them. The like Experiment may be as conveniently try’d with
the seeds of any Plant, whose growth is hasty, and its size Bulky. If Tobacco
will in These Cold Climates Grow well in Earth undung’d, it would not be
amiss to make a Tryal with it; for ’tis an annual Plant, that arises where it
prospers, sometimes as high as a Tall Man; and I have had leaves of it in my
Garden neer a Foot and a Halfe broad. But the next time I Try this
Experiment, it shall be with several seeds of the same sort, in the same pot
of Earth, that so the event may be the more Conspicuous. But because every
Body has not Conveniency of time and place for this Experiment neither, I
made in my Chamber, some shorter and more Expeditions Tryals. I took a
Top of Spearmint, about an Inch Long, and put it into a good Vial full of
Spring water, so as the upper part of the Mint was above the neck of the
Glass, and the lower part Immers’d in the Water; within a few Dayes this
Mint began to shoot forth Roots into the Water, and to display its Leaves,
and aspire upwards; and in a short time it had numerous Roots and Leaves,
and these very strong and fragrant of the Odour of the Mint: but the Heat of
my Chamber, as I suppose, kill’d the Plant when it was grown to have a
pretty thick Stalk, which with the various and ramified Roots, which it shot
into the Water as if it had been Earth, presented in its Transparent Flower-
pot a Spectacle not unpleasant to behold. The like I try’d with sweet
Marjoram, and I found the Experiment succeed also, though somewhat
more slowly, with Balme and Peniroyal, to name now no other Plants. And
one of these Vegetables, cherish’d only by Water, having obtain’d a
competent Growth, I did, for Tryals sake, cause to be Distill’d in a small
Retort, and thereby obtain’d some Phlegme, a little Empyreumaticall Spirit,
a small Quantity of adust Oyl, and a Caput mortuum; which appearing to be
a Coal concluded it to consist of Salt and Earth: but the Quantity of it was
so small that I forbore to Calcine it. The Water I us’d to nourish this Plant
was not shifted nor renewed; and I chose Spring-water rather than Rain-
water, because the latter is more discernably a kinde of πανσπερμια, which,
though it be granted to be freed from grosser Mixtures, seems yet to
Contain in it, besides the Steams of several Bodies wandering in the Air,

which may be suppos’d to impregnate it, a certain Spirituous Substance,
which may be Extracted out of it, and is by some mistaken for the Spirit of
the World Corporify’d, upon what Grounds, and with what Probability, I
may elsewhere perchance, but must not now, Discourse to you.
But perhaps I might have sav’d a great part of my Labour. For I finde that
Helmont (an Author more considerable for his Experiments than many
Learned men are pleas’d to think him) having had an Opportunity to
prosecute an Experiment much of the same nature with those I have been
now speaking of, for five Years together, obtain’d at the end of that time so
notable a Quantity of Transmuted Water, that I should scarce Think it fit to
have his Experiment, and Mine Mention’d together, were it not that the
Length of Time Requisite to this may deterr the Curiosity of some, and
exceed the leasure of Others; and partly, that so Paradoxical a Truth as that
which these Experiments seem to hold forth, needs to be Confirm’d by
more Witnesses then one, especially since the Extravagancies and Untruths
to be met with in Helmonts Treatise of the Magnetick Cure of Wounds, have
made his Testimonies suspected in his other Writings, though as to some of
the Unlikely matters of Fact he delivers in them, I might safely undertake to
be his Compurgator. But that Experiment of his which I was mentioning to
You, he sayes, was this. He took 200 pound of Earth dry’d in an Oven, and
having put it into an Earthen Vessel and moisten’d it with Raine water he
planted in it the Trunk of a Willow tree of five pound Weight; this he
Water’d, as need required, with Rain or with Distill’d Water; and to keep
the Neighbouring Earth from getting into the Vessell, he employ’d a plate of
Iron tinn’d over and perforated with many holes. Five years being efflux’d,
he took out the Tree and weighed it, and (with computing the leaves that fell
during four Autumnes) he found it to weigh 169 pound, and about three
Ounces. And Having again Dry’d the Earth it grew in, he found it want of
its Former Weight of 200 Pound, about a couple only of Ounces; so that 164
pound of the Roots, Wood, and Bark, which Constituted the Tree, seem to
have Sprung from the Water. And though it appears not that Helmont had
the Curiosity to make any Analysis of this Plant, yet what I lately told You I
did to One of the Vegetables I nourish’d with Water only, will I suppose
keep You from Doubting that if he had Distill’d this Tree, it would have
afforded him the like Distinct Substances as another Vegetable of the same
kind. I need not Subjoyne that I had it also in my thoughts to try how

Experiments to the same purpose with those I related to You would succeed
in other Bodies then Vegetables, because importunate Avocations having
hitherto hinder’d me from putting my Design in Practise, I can yet speak
but Confecturally of the Success: but the best is, that the Experiments
already made and mention’d to you need not the Assistance of new Ones, to
Verifie as much as my present task makes it concern me to prove by
Experiments of this Nature.
One would suspect (sayes Eleutherius after his long silence) by what You
have been discoursing, that You are not far from Helmonts Opinion about
the Origination of Compound Bodies, and perhaps too dislike not the
Arguments which he imployes to prove it.
What Helmontian Opinion, and what Arguments do you mean (askes
Carneades.)
What You have been Newly Discoursing (replies Eleutherius) tells us, that
You cannot but know that this bold and Acute Spagyrist scruples not to
Assert that all mixt Bodies spring from one Element; and that Vegetables,
Animals, Marchasites, Stones, Metalls, &c. are Materially but simple Water
disguis’d into these Various Formes, by the plastick or Formative Virtue of
their seeds. And as for his Reasons you may find divers of them scatter’d up
and(216) down his writings; the considerabl’st of which seem to be these
three; The Ultimate Reduction of mixt Bodies into Insipid Water, the
Vicissitude of the supposed Elements, and the production of perfectly mixt
Bodies out of simple Water. And first he affirmes that the Sal circulatus
Paracelsi, or his Liquor Alkahest, does adequately resolve Plants, Animals,
and Mineralls into one Liquor or more, according to their several internall
Disparities of Parts (without Caput Mortuum, or the Destruction of their
seminal Virtues;) and that the Alkahest being abstracted from these Liquors
in the same weight and Virtue wherewith it Dissolv’d them, the Liquors
may by frequent Cohobations from chalke or some other idoneous matter,
be Totally depriv’d of their seminal Endowments, and return at last to their
first matter, Insipid Water; some other wayes he proposes here and there, to
divest some particular Bodies of their borrow’d shapes, and make them
remigrate to their first Simplicity. The second Topick whence Helmont
drawes his Arguments, to prove Water to be the Material cause of Mixt
Bodies, I told You was this, that the other suppos’d Elements may be

transmuted into one another. But the Experiments by him here and there
produc’d on this Occasion, are so uneasie to be made and to be judg’d of,
that I shall not insist on them; not to mention, that if they were granted to be
true, his Inference from them is somewhat disputable; and therefore I shall
pass on to tell You, That as, in his First Argument, our Paradoxical Author
endeavours to prove Water the Sole Element of Mixt Bodies, by their
Ultimate Resolution, when by his Alkahest, or some other conquering
Agent, the Seeds have been Destroy’d, which Disguis’d them, or when by
time those seeds are Weari’d or Exantlated or unable to Act their Parts upon
the Stage of the Universe any Longer: So in His Third Argument he
Endeavours to evince the same Conclusion, by the constitution of Bodies
which he asserts to be nothing but Water Subdu’d by Seminal Virtues. Of
this he gives here and there in his Writings several Instances, as to Plants
and Animals; but divers of them being Difficult either to be try’d or to be
Understood, and others of them being not altogether Unobnoxious to
Exceptions, I think you have singl’d out the Principal and less Questionable
Experiment when you lately mention’d that of the Willow Tree. And having
thus, Continues Eleutherius, to Answer your Question, given you a
Summary Account of what I am Confident You know better then I do, I
shall be very glad to receive Your Sence of it, if the giving it me will not too
much Divert You from the Prosecution of your Discourse.
That If (replies Carneades) was not needlessly annex’d: for thorowly to
examine such an Hypothesis and such Arguments would require so many
Considerations, and Consequently so much time, that I should not now have
the Liesure to perfect such a Digression, and much less to finish my
Principle Discourse. Yet thus much I shall tell You at present, that you need
not fear my rejecting this Opinion for its Novelty; since, however the
Helmontians may in complement to their Master pretend it to be a new
Discovery, Yet though the Arguments be for the most part his, the Opinion it
self is very Antient: For Diogenes Laertius and divers other Authors speak
of Thales, as the first among the Græcians that made disquisitions upon
nature. And of this Thales, I Remember, Tully De Natura Deorum. informes us,
that he taught all things were at first made of Water. And it seems by
Plutarch and Justin Martyr, that the Opinion was Ancienter then he: For
they tell us that he us’d to defend his Tenet by the Testimony of Homer.
And a Greek Author, (the Scholiast of Apollonius) upon these Words

Εξ ιλιου εβλαϛησε χθων αυτη, Argonaut. 4.
The Earth of Slime was made,
Affirms (out of Zeno) that the Chaos, whereof all things were made, was,
according to Hesiod, Water; which, settling first, became Slime, and then
condens’d into solid Earth. And the same Opinion about the Generation of
Slime seems to have been entertain’d by Orpheus, out of whom one of the
Antients Athenagoras. cites this Testimony,
Εκ του ὑδατος ιλυι κατιϛη.
Of Water Slime was made.
It seems also by what is delivered in Strabo Universarum rerum primordia diverta
esse, faciendi autem mundi initium aquam. Strabo. Geograp. lib. 15. circa medium. out of
another Author, concerning the Indians, That they likewise held that all
things had differing Beginnings, but that of which the World was made, was
Water. And the like Opinion has been by some of the Antients ascrib’d to
the Phœnicians, from whom Thales himself is conceiv’d to have borrow’d
it; as probably the Greeks did much of their Theologie, and, as I am apt to
think, of their Philosophy too; since the Devising of the Atomical
Hypothesis commonly ascrib’d to Lucippus and his Disciple Democritus, is
by Learned Men attributed to one Moschus a Phœnician. And possibly the
Opinion is yet antienter than so; For ’tis known that the Phœnicians
borrow’d most of their Learning from the Hebrews. And among those that
acknowledge the Books of Moses, many have been inclin’d to think Water
to have been the Primitive and Universal Matter, by perusing the Beginning
of Genesis, where the Waters seem to be mention’d as the Material Cause,
not only of Sublunary Compounded Bodies, but of all those that make up
the Universe; whose Component Parts did orderly, as it were, emerge out of
that vast Abysse, by the Operation of the Spirit of God, who is said to have
been moving Himself as hatching Females do (as the Original ‫םרחפת‬,
Meracephet Deuter. 32. 11. is said to Import, and as it seems to signifie in one
of the two other places, wherein alone I have met with it in the Hebrew
Bible) Jerem. 23. 9. upon the Face of the Waters; which being, as may be
suppos’d, Divinely Impregnated with the seeds of all things, were by that
productive Incubation qualify’d to produce them. But you, I presume,
Expect that I should Discourse of this Matter like a Naturalist, not a

Philologer. Wherefore I shall add, to Countenance Helmont’s Opinion, That
whereas he gives not, that I remember, any Instance of any Mineral Body,
nor scarce of any Animal, generated of Water, a French Chymist, Monsieur
de Rochas, has presented his Readers an Experiment, which if it were
punctually such as he has deliver’d it, is very Notable. He then, Discoursing
of the Generation of things according to certain Chymical and Metaphorical
Notions (which I confess are not to me Intelligible) sets down, among
divers Speculations not pertinent to our Subject, the following Narrative,
which I shall repeat to you the sence of in English, with as little variation
from the Literal sence of the French words, as my memory will enable me.
Having (sayes he) discern’d such great Wonders by the Natural Operation
of Water, I would know what may be done with it by Art Imitating Nature.
Wherefore I took Water which I well knew not to be compounded, nor to be
mix’d with any other thing than that Spirit of Life (whereof he had spoken
before;) and with a Heat Artificial, Continual and Proportionate, I prepar’d
and dispos’d it by the above mention’d Graduations of Coagulation,
Congelation, and Fixation, untill it was turn’d into Earth, which Earth
produc’d Animals, Vegetables and Minerals. I tell not what Animals,
Vegetables and Minerals, for that is reserv’d for another Occasion: but the
Animals did Move of themselves, Eat, &c.—and by the true Anatomie I
made of them, I found that they were compos’d of much Sulphur, little
Mercury, and less Salt.—The Minerals began to grow and encrease by
converting into their own Nature one part of the Earth thereunto dispos’d;
they were solid and heavy. And by this truly Demonstrative Science, namely
Chymistry, I found that they were compos’d of much Salt, little Sulphur, and
less Mercury.
But (sayes Carneades) I have some Suspitions concerning this strange
Relation, which make me unwilling to Declare an Opinion of it, unless I
were satisfied concerning divers Material Circumstances that our Author
has left unmentioned; though as for the Generation of Living Creatures,
both Vegetable and Sensitive, it needs not seem Incredible, since we finde
that our common water (which indeed is often Impregnated with Variety of
Seminal Principles and Rudiments) being long kept in a quiet place will
putrifie and stink, and then perhaps too produce Moss and little Worms, or
other Insects, according to the nature of the Seeds that were lurking in it. I
must likewise desire you to take Notice, that as Helmont gives us no

Instance of the Production of Minerals out of Water, so the main Argument
that he employ’s to prove that they and other Bodies may be resolv’d into
water, is drawn from the Operations of his Alkahest, and consequently
cannot be satisfactorily Examin’d by You and Me.
Yet certainly (sayes Eleutherius) You cannot but have somewhat wonder’d
as well as I, to observe how great a share of Water goes to the making up of
Divers Bodies, whose Disguises promise nothing neere so much. The
Distillation of Eeles, though it yielded me some Oyle, and Spirit, and
Volatile Salt, besides the Caput mortuum, yet were all these so
disproportionate to the Phlegm that came from them (and in which at first
they boyl’d as in a Pot of Water) that they seem’d to have bin nothing but
coagulated Phlegm, which does likewise strangely abound in Vipers, though
they are esteem’d very hot in Operation, and will in a Convenient Aire
survive some dayes the loss of their Heads and Hearts, so vigorous is their
Vivacity. Mans Bloud it self as Spirituous, and as Elaborate a Liquor as ’tis
reputed, does so abound in Phlegm, that, the other Day, Distilling some of it
on purpose to try the Experiment (as I had formerly done in Deers Bloud)
out of about seven Ounces and a half of pure Bloud we drew neere six
Ounces of Phlegm, before any of the more operative Principles began to
arise, and Invite us to change the Receiver. And to satisfie my self that some
of these Animall Phlegms were void enough of Spirit to deserve that Name,
I would not content my self to taste them only, but fruitlesly pour’d on them
acid Liquors, to try if they contain’d any Volatile Salt or Spirit, which (had
there been any there) would probably have discover’d it self by making an
Ebullition with the affused Liquor. And now I mention Corrosive Spirits, I
am minded to Informe you, That though they seem to be nothing else but
Fluid Salts, yet they abound in Water, as you may Observe, if either you
Entangle, and so Fix their Saline Part, by making them Corrode some
idoneous Body, or else if you mortifie it with a contrary Salt; as I have very
manifestly Observ’d in the making a Medecine somewhat like Helmont’s
Balsamus Samech, with Distill’d Vinager instead of Spirit of Wine,
wherewith he prepares it: For you would scarce Beleeve (what I have lately
Observ’d) that of that acid Spirit, the Salt of Tartar, from which it is
Distill’d, will by mortifying and retaining the acid Salt turn into worthless
Phlegm neere twenty times its weight, before it be so fully Impregnated as
to rob no more Distill’d Vinager of its Salt. And though Spirit of Wine

Exquisitely rectify’d seem of all Liquors to be the most free from Water, it
being so Igneous that it will Flame all away without leaving the least Drop
behinde it, yet even this Fiery Liquor is by Helmont not improbably
affirm’d, in case what he relates be True, to be Materially Water, under a
Sulphureous Disguise: For, according to him, in the making that excellent
Medecine, Paracelsus his Balsamus Samech, (which is nothing but Sal
Tartari dulcify’d by Distilling from it Spirit of Wine till the Salt be
sufficiently glutted with its Sulphur, and suffer the Liquor to be drawn off,
as strong as it was pour’d on) when the Salt of Tartar from which it is
Distill’d hath retain’d, or depriv’d it of the Sulphureous parts of the Spirit
of Wine, the rest, which is incomparably the greater part of the Liquor, will
remigrate into Phlegm. I added that Clause [In case what he Relates be
True] because I have not as yet sufficiently try’d it my self. But not only
something of Experiment keeps me from thinking it, as many Chymists do,
absurd, (though I have, as well as they, in vain try’d it with ordinary Salt of
Tartar;) but besides that Helmont often Relates it, and draws Consequences
from it; A Person noted for his Sobernesse and Skill in Spagyrical
Preparations, having been askt by me, Whether the Experiment might not
be made to succeed, if the Salt and Spirit were prepar’d according to a way
suitable to my Principles, he affirm’d to me, that he had that way I propos’d
made Helmont’s Experiment succeed very well, without adding any thing to
the Salt and Spirit. But our way is neither short nor Easie.
I have indeed (sayes Carneades) sometimes wonder’d to see how much
Phlegme may be obtain’d from Bodies by the Fire. But concerning that
Phlegme I may anon have Occasion to note something, which I therefore
shall not now anticipate. But to return to the Opinion of Thales, and of
Helmont, I consider, that supposing the Alkahest could reduce all Bodies
into water, yet whether that water, because insipid, must be Elementary,
may not groundlesly be doubted; For I remember the Candid and Eloquent
Petrus Laurembergius in his Notes upon Sala’s Aphorismes affirmes, that
he saw an insipid Menstruum that was a powerfull Dissolvent, and (if my
Memory do not much mis-informe me) could dissolve Gold. And the water
which may be Drawn from Quicksilver without Addition, though it be
almost Tastless, You will I believe think of a differing Nature from simple
Water, especially if you Digest in it Appropriated Mineralls. To which I
shall add but this, that this Consideration may be further extended. For I see

no Necessity to conceive that the Water mention’d in the Beginning of
Genesis, as the Universal Matter, was simple and Elementary Water; since
though we should Suppose it to have been an Agitated Congeries or Heap
consisting of a great Variety of Seminal Principles and Rudiments, and of
other Corpuscles fit to be subdu’d and Fashion’d by them, it might yet be a
Body Fluid like Water, in case the Corpuscles it was made up of, were by
their Creator made small enough, and put into such an actuall Motion as
might make them Glide along one another. And as we now say, the Sea
consists of Water, notwithstanding the Saline, Terrestrial, and other Bodies
mingl’d with it,) such a Liquor may well enough be called Water, because
that was the greatest of the known Bodies whereunto it was like; Though,
that a Body may be Fluid enough to appear a Liquor, and yet contain
Corpuscles of a very differing Nature, You will easily believe, if You but
expose a good Quantity of Vitriol in a strong Vessel to a Competent Fire.
For although it contains both Aqueous, Earthy, Saline, Sulphureous, and
Metalline Corpuscles, yet the whole Mass will at first be Fluid like water,
and boyle like a seething pot.
I might easily (Continues Carneades) enlarge my self on such
Considerations, if I were Now Oblig’d to give You my Judgment of the
Thalesian, and Helmontian, Hypothesis. But Whether or no we conclude
that all things were at first Generated of Water, I may Deduce from what I
have try’d Concerning the Growth of Vegetables, nourish’d with water, all
that I now propos’d to my Self or need at present to prove, namely that Salt,
Spirit, Earth, and ev’n Oyl (though that be thought of all Bodies the most
opposite to Water) may be produc’d out of Water; and consequently that a
Chymical Principle as well as a Peripatetick Element, may (in some cases)
be Generated anew, or obtain’d from such a parcel of Matter as was not
endow’d with the form of such a principle or Element before.
And having thus, Eleutherius, Evinc’d that ’tis possible that such
Substances as those that Chymists are wont to call their Tria Prima, may be
Generated, anew: I must next Endeavour to make it Probable, that the
Operation of the Fire does Actually (sometimes) not only divide
Compounded Bodies into smal Parts, but Compound those Parts after a new
Manner; whence Consequently, for ought we Know, there may Emerge as
well Saline and Sulphureous Substances, as Bodies of other Textures. And
perhaps it will assist us in our Enquiry after the Effects of the Operations of

the Fire upon other Bodies, to Consider a little, what it does to those
Mixtures which being Productions of the Art of Man, We best know the
Composition of. You may then be pleas’d to take Notice that though Sope is
made up by the Sope-Boylers of Oyle or Grease, and Salt, and Water
Diligently Incorporated together, yet if You expose the Mass they Constitute
to a Graduall Fire in a Retort, You shall then indeed make a Separation, but
not of the same Substances that were United into Sope, but of others of a
Distant and yet not an Elementary Nature, and especially of an Oyle very
sharp and Fætid, and of a very Differing Quality from that which was
Employ’d to make the Sope: fo if you Mingle in a due Proportion, Sal
Armoniack with Quick-Lime, and Distill them by Degrees of Fire, You shall
not Divide the Sal Armoniack from the Quick-Lime, though the one be a
Volatile, and the other a Fix’d Substance, but that which will ascend will be
a Spirit much more Fugitive, Penetrant, and stinking, then Sal Armoniack;
and there will remain with the Quick-Lime all or very near all the Sea Salt
that concurr’d to make up the Sal Armoniack; concerning which Sea Salt I
shall, to satisfie You how well it was United to the Lime, informe You, that
I have by making the Fire at length very Vehement, caus’d both the
Ingredients to melt in the Retort it self into one Mass and such Masses are
apt to Relent in the Moist Air. If it be here Objected, that these Instances are
taken from factitious Concretes which are more Compounded then those
which Nature produces; I shall reply, that besides that I have Mention’d
them as much to Illustrate what I propos’d, as to prove it, it will be Difficult
to Evince that Nature her self does not make Decompound Bodies, I mean
mingle together such mixt Bodies as are already Compounded of
Elementary, or rather of more simple ones. For Vitriol (for Instance) though
I have sometimes taken it out of Minerall Earths, where Nature had without
any assistance of Art prepar’d it to my Hand, is really, though Chymists are
pleas’d to reckon it among Salts, a De-compounded Body Consisting (as I
shall have occasion to declare anon) of a Terrestriall Substance, of a Metal,
and also of at least one Saline Body, of a peculiar and not Elementary
Nature. And we see also in Animals, that their blood may be compos’d of
Divers very Differing Mixt Bodies, since we find it observ’d that divers
Sea-Fowle tast rank of the Fish on which they ordinarily feed; and
Hipocrates himself Observes, that a Child may be purg’d by the Milke of
the Nurse, if she have taken Elaterium; which argues that the purging
Corpuscles of the Medicament Concurr to make up the Milke of the Nurse;

and that white Liquor is generally by Physitians suppos’d to be but blanch’d
and alter’d Blood. And I remember I have observ’d, not farr from the Alps,
that at a certain time of the Year the Butter of that Country was very
Offensive to strangers, by reason of the rank tast of a certain Herb, whereon
the Cows were then wont plentifully to feed. But (proceeds Carneades) to
give you Instances of another kind, to shew that things may be obtain’d by
the Fire from a Mixt Body that were not Pre-existent in it, let Me Remind
You, that from many Vegetables there may without any Addition be
Obtain’d Glass, a Body, which I presume You will not say was Pre-existent
in it, but produc’d by the Fire. To which I shall add but this one Example
more, namely that by a certain Artificial way of handling Quicksilver, You
may without Addition separate from it at least a 5th. or 4th. part of a clear
Liquor, which with an Ordinary Peripatetick would pass for Water, and
which a Vulgar Chymist would not scruple to call Phlegme, and which, for
ought I have yet seen or heard, is not reducible into Mercury again, and
Consequently is more then a Disguise of it. Now besides that divers
Chymists will not allow Mercury to have any or at least any Considerable
Quantity of either of the Ignoble Ingredients, Earth and Water; Besides this,
I say, the great Ponderousness of Quicksilver makes it very unlikely that it
can have so much Water in it as may be thus obtain’d from it, since
Mercury weighs 12 or 14 times as much as water of the same Bulk. Nay for
a further Confirmation of this Argument, I will add this Strange Relation,
that two Friends of mine, the one a Physitian, and the other a
Mathematician, and both of them Persons of unsuspected Credit, have
Solemnly assured me, that after many Tryals they made, to reduce Mercury
into Water, in Order to a Philosophicall Work, upon Gold (which yet, by the
way, I know prov’d Unsuccesfull) they did once by divers Cohobations
reduce a pound of Quicksilver into almost a pound of Water, and this
without the Addition of any other Substance, but only by pressing the
Mercury by a Skillfully Manag’d Fire in purposely contriv’d Vessels. But of
these Experiments our Friend (sayes Carneades, pointing at the Register of
this Dialogue) will perhaps give You a more Particular Account then it is
necessary for me to do: Since what I have now said may sufficiently evince,
that the Fire may sometimes as well alter Bodies as divide them, and by it
we may obtain from a Mixt Body what was not Pre-existent in it. And how
are we sure that in no other Body what we call Phlegme is barely separated,
not Produc’d by the Action of the Fire: Since so many other Mixt Bodies

are of a much less Constant, and more alterable Nature, then Mercury, by
many Tricks it is wont to put upon Chymists, and by the Experiments I told
You of, about an hour since, Appears to be. But because I shall ere long
have Occasion to resume into Consideration the Power of the Fire to
produce new Concretes, I shall no longer insist on this Argument at present;
only I must mind You, that if You will not dis-believe Helmonts Relations,
You must confess that the Tria Prima are neither ingenerable nor
incorruptible Substances; since by his Alkahest some of them may be
produc’d of Bodies that were before of another Denomination; and by the
same powerfull Menstruum all of them may be reduc’d into insipid Water.
Here Carneades was about to pass on to his Third Consideration, when
Eleutherius being desirous to hear what he could say to clear his second
General Consideration from being repugnant to what he seem’d to think the
true Theory of Mistion, prevented him by telling him, I somewhat wonder,
Carneades, that You, who are in so many Points unsatisfied with the
Peripatetick Opinion touching the Elements and Mixt Bodies, should also
seem averse to that Notion touching the manner of Mistion, wherein the
Chymists (though perhaps without knowing that they do so) agree with
most of the Antient Philosophers that preceded Aristotle, and that for
Reasons so considerable, that divers Modern Naturalists and Physitians, in
other things unfavourable enough to the Spagyrists, do in this case side with
them against the common Opinion of the Schools. If you should ask me
(continues Eleutherius) what Reasons I mean? I should partly by the
Writings of Sennertus and other learned Men, and partly by my own
Thoughts, be supply’d with more, then ’twere at present proper for me to
Insist largely on. And therefore I shall mention only, and that briefly, three
or four. Of these, I shall take the First from the state of the Controversie
itself, and the genuine Notion of Mistion, which though much intricated by
the Schoolmen, I take in short to be this, Aristotle, at least as many of his
Interpreters expound him, and as indeed he Teaches in some places, where
he professedly Dissents from the Antients, declares Mistion to be such a
mutual Penetration, and perfect Union of the mingl’d Elements, that there is
no Portion of the mixt Body, how Minute soever, which does not(140)
contain All, and Every of the Four Elements, or in which, if you please, all
the Elements are not. And I remember, that he reprehends the Mistion
taught by the Ancients, as too sleight or gross, for this Reason, that Bodies

mixt according to their Hypothesis, though they appear so to humane Eyes,
would not appear such to the acute Eyes of a Lynx, whose perfecter Sight
would discerne the Elements, if they were no otherwise mingled, than as his
Predecessors would have it, to be but Blended, not United; whereas the
Antients, though they did not all Agree about what kind of Bodies were
Mixt, yet they did almost unanimously hold, that in a compounded Bodie,
though the Miscibilia, whether Elements, Principles, or whatever they
pleas’d to call them, were associated in such small Parts, and with so much
Exactness, that there was no sensible Part of the Mass but seem’d to be of
the same Nature with the rest, and with the whole; Yet as to the Atomes, or
other Insensible Parcels of Matter, whereof each of the Miscibilia consisted,
they retain’d each of them its own Nature, being but by Apposition or
Juxta-Position uni(141)ted with the rest into one Bodie. So that although by
virtue of this composition the mixt Body did perhaps obtain Divers new
Qualities, yet still the Ingredients that Compounded it, retaining their own
Nature, were by the Destruction of the Compositum separable from each
other, the minute Parts disingag’d from those of a differing Nature, and
associated with those of their own sort returning to be again, Fire, Earth, or
Water, as they were before they chanc’d to be Ingredients of that
Compositum. This may be explain’d (Continues Eleutherius,) by a piece of
Cloath made of white and black threds interwoven, wherein though the
whole piece appear neither white nor black, but of a resulting Colour, that is
gray, yet each of the white and black threds that compose it, remains what it
was before, as would appear if the threds were pull’d asunder, and sorted
each Colour by it self. This (pursues Eleutherius) being, as I understand it,
the State of the Controversie, and the Aristotelians after their Master
Commonly Defining, that Mistion is Miscibilium alteratorum Unio, that
seems to comport much better with the Opinion of the Chymists, then with
that of their Adversaries, since according to that as the newly mention’d
Example declares, there is but a Juxta-position of separable Corpuscles,
retaining each its own Nature, whereas according to the Aristotelians, when
what they are pleas’d to call a mixt Body results from the Concourse of the
Elements, the Miscibilia cannot so properly be said to be Alter’d, as
Destroy’d, since there is no Part in the mixt Body, how small soever, that
can be call’d either Fir, or Air, or Water, or Earth.

Nor indeed can I well understand, how Bodies can be mingl’d other wayes
then as I have declar’d, or at least how they can be mingl’d, as our
Peripateticks would have it. For whereas Aristotle tells us, that if a Drop of
Wine be put into ten thousand Measures of Water, the Wine being
Overpower’d by so Vast a Quantity of Water will be turn’d into it, he speaks
to my Apprehension, very improbably; For though One should add to that
Quantity of Water as many Drops of Wine as would a Thousand times
exceed it all, yet by his Rule the whole Liquor should not be a Crama, a
Mixture of Wine and Water, wherein the Wine would be Predominant, but
Water only; Since the Wine being added but by a Drop at a time would still
Fall into nothing but Water, and Consequently would be turn’d into it. And
if this would hold in Metals too, ’twere a rare secret for Goldsmiths, and
Refiners; For by melting a Mass of Gold, or Silver, and by but casting into
it Lead or Antimony, Grain after Grain, they might at pleasure, within a
reasonable Compass of time, turn what Quantity they desire, of the Ignoble
into the Noble Metalls. And indeed since a Pint of wine, and a pint of water,
amount to about a Quart of Liquor, it seems manifest to sense, that these
Bodies doe not Totally Penetrate one another, as one would have it; but that
each retains its own Dimensions; and Consequently, that they are by being
Mingl’d only divided into minute Bodies, that do but touch one another
with their Surfaces, as do the Grains, of Wheat, Rye, Barley, &c. in a heap
of severall sorts of Corn: And unless we say, that as(144) when one measure
of wheat, for Instance, is Blended with a hundred measures of Barley, there
happens only a Juxta-position and Superficial Contact betwixt the Grains of
wheat, and as many or thereabouts of the Grains of Barley. So when a Drop
of wine is mingl’d with a great deal of water, there is but an Apposition of
so many Vinous Corpuscles to a Correspondent Number of Aqueous ones;
Unless I say this be said, I see not how that Absurdity will be avoyded,
whereunto the Stoical Notion of mistion (namely by συνχυσις, or
Confusion) was Liable, according to which the least Body may be co-
extended with the greatest: Since in a mixt Body wherein before the
Elements were Mingl’d there was, for Instance, but one pound of water to
ten thousand of Earth, yet according to them there must not be the least part
of that Compound, that Consisted not as well of Earth, as water. But I insist,
Perhaps, too long (sayes Eleutherius) upon the proofs afforded me by the
Nature of Mistion: Wherefore I will but name Two or Three other
Arguments; whereof the first shall be,(145) that according to Aristotle

himself, the motion of a mixt Body followes the Nature of the Predominant
Element, as those wherein the Earth prevails, tend towards the Centre of
heavy Bodies. And since many things make it Evident, that in divers Mixt
Bodies the Elementary Qualities are as well Active, though not altogether
so much so as in the Elements themselves, it seems not reasonable to deny
the actual Existence of the Elements in those Bodies wherein they Operate.
To which I shall add this Convincing Argument, that Experience manifests,
and Aristotle Confesses it, that the Miscibilia may be again separated from a
mixt Body, as is Obvious in the Chymical Resolutions of Plants and
Animalls, which could not be unless they did actually retain their formes in
it: For since, according to Aristotle, and I think according to truth, there is
but one common Mass of all things, which he has been pleas’d to call
Materia Prima; And since tis not therefore the Matter but the Forme that
Constitutes and Discriminates Things, to say that the Elements remain not
in a Mixt Body, according to their Formes, but according to their Matter, is
not to say that they remain there at all; Since although those Portions of
Matter were Earth and water, &c. before they concurr’d, yet the resulting
Body being once Constituted, may as well be said to be simple as any of the
Elements, the Matter being confessedly of the same Nature in all Bodies,
and the Elementary Formes being according to this Hypothesis perish’d and
abolish’d.
And lastly, and if we will Consult Chymical Experiments, we shall find the
Advantages of the Chymical Doctrine above the Peripatetick Title little less
then Palpable. For in that Operation that Refiners call Quartation, which
they employ to purifie Gold, although three parts of Silver be so exquisitely
mingl’d by Fusion with a fourth Part of Gold (whence the Operation is
Denominated) that the resulting Mass acquires severall new Qualities, by
virtue of the Composition, and that there is scarce any sensible part of it that
is not Compos’d of both the metalls; Yet if You cast this mixture into Aqua
Fortis, the Silver will be dissolv’d in the Menstruum, and the Gold like a
dark or black Powder will fall to the Bottom of it, and either Body may be
again reduc’d into such a Metal as it was before, which shews: that it
retain’d its Nature, notwithstanding its being mixt per Minima with the
other: We likewise see, that though one part of pure Silver be mingled with
eight or ten Parts, or more, of Lead, yet the Fire will upon the Cuppel easily
and perfectly separate them again. And that which I would have you

peculiarly Consider on this Occasion is, that not only in Chymicall
Anatomies there is a Separation made of the Elementary Ingredients, but
that some Mixt Bodies afford a very much greater Quantity of this or that
Element or Principle than of another; as we see, that Turpentine and Amber
yield much more Oyl and Sulphur than they do Water, whereas Wine, which
is confess’d to be a perfectly mixt Bodie, yields but a little Inflamable
Spirit, or Sulphur, and not much more Earth; but affords a vast proportion
of Phlegm or water: which could not be, if as the Peripateticks suppose,
every, even of the minutest Particles, were of the same nature with the
whole, and consequently did contain both Earth and Water, and Aire, and
Fire; Wherefore as to what Aristotle principally, and almost only Objects,
that unless his Opinion be admitted, there would be no true and perfect
Mistion, but onely Aggregates or Heaps of contiguous Corpuscles, which,
though the Eye of Man cannot discerne, yet the Eye of a Lynx might
perceive not to be of the same Nature with one another and with their
Totum, as the Nature of Mistion requires, if he do not beg the Question, and
make Mistion to consist in what other Naturalists deny to be requisite to it,
yet He at least objects That as a great Inconvenience which I cannot take for
such, till he have brought as Considerable Arguments as I have propos’d to
prove the contrary, to evince that Nature makes other Mistions than such as
I have allowed, wherein the Miscibilia are reduc’d into minute Parts, and
United as farr as sense can discerne: which if You will not grant to be
sufficient for a true Mistion, he must have the same Quarrel with Nature her
self, as with his Adversaries.
Wherefore (Continues Eleutherius) I cannot but somewhat marvail that
Carneades should oppose the Doctrine of the Chymist in a Particular,
wherein they do as well agree with his old Mistress, Nature, as dissent from
his old Adversary, Aristotle.
I must not (replies Carneades) engage my self at present to examine
thorowly the Controversies concerning Mistion: And if there were no third
thing, but that I were reduc’d to embrace absolutely and unreservedly either
the Opinion of Aristotle, or that of the Philosophers that went before him, I
should look upon the latter, which the Chymists have adopted, as the more
defensible Opinion: But because differing in the Opinions about the
Elements from both Parties, I think I can take a middle Course, and
Discourse to you of Mistion after a way that does neither perfectly agree,

nor perfectly disagree with either, as I will not peremptorily define, whether
there be not Cases wherein some Phænomena of Mistion seem to favour the
Opinion that the Chymists Patrons borrow’d of the Antients, I shall only
endeavour to shew You that there are some cases which may keep the
Doubt, which makes up my second General Consideration from being
unreasonable.
I shall then freely acknowledge to You (sayes Carneades) that I am not over
well satisfi’d with the Doctrine that is ascribed to Aristotle, concerning
Mistion, especially since it teaches that the four Elements may again be
separated from the mixt Body; whereas if they continu’d not in it, it would
not be so much a Separation as a Production. And I think the Ancient
Philosophers that Preceded Aristotle, and Chymists who have since receiv’d
the same Opinion, do speak of this matter more intelligibly, if not more
probably, then the Peripateticks: but though they speak Congruously
enough, to their believing, that there are a certain Number of Primogeneal
Bodies, by whose Concourse all those we call Mixts are Generated, and
which in the Destruction of mixt Bodies do barely part company, and recede
from one another, just such as they were when they came together; yet I,
who meet with very few Opinions that I can entirely Acquiesce in, must
confess to You that I am inclin’d to differ not only from the Aristotelians,
but from the old Philosophers and the Chymists, about the Nature of
Mistion: And if You will give me leave, I shall Briefly propose to you my
present Notion of it, provided you will look upon it, not so much as an
Assertion as an Hypothesis; in talking of which I do not now pretend to
propose and debate the whole Doctrine of Mistion, but to shew that ’tis not
Improbable, that sometimes mingl’d substances may be so strictly united,
that it doth not by the usuall Operations of the Fire, by which Chymists are
wont to suppose themselves to have made the Analyses of mixt Bodies,
sufficiently appear, that in such Bodies the Miscibilia that concurr’d to
make them up do each of them retain its own peculiar Nature: and by the
Spagyrists Fires may be more easily extricated and Recover’d, than Alter’d,
either by a Change of Texture in the Parts of the same Ingredient, or by an
Association with some parts of another Ingredient more strict than was that
of the parts of this or that Miscibile among themselves. At these words Eleu.
having press’d him to do what he propos’d, and promis’d to do what he
desir’d;

I consider then (resumes Carneades) that, not to mention those improper
Kinds of mistion, wherein Homogeneous Bodies are Joyn’d, as when Water
is mingl’d with water, or two Vessels full of the same kind of Wine with one
another, the mistion I am now to Discourse of seems, Generally speaking,
to be but an Union per Minima of any two or more Bodies of differing
Denominations; as when Ashes and Sand are Colliquated into Glass or
Antimony, and Iron into Regulus Martis, or Wine and Water are mingl’d,
and Sugar is dissolv’d in the Mixture. Now in this general notion of Mistion
it does not appear clearly comprehended, that the Miscibilia or Ingredients
do in their small Parts so retain their Nature and remain distinct in the
Compound, that they may thence by the Fire be again taken asunder: For
though I deny not that in some Mistions of certain permanent Bodies this
Recovery of the same Ingredients may be made, yet I am not convinc’d that
it will hold in all or even in most, or that it is necessarily deducible from
Chymicall Experiments, and the true Notion of Mistion. To explain this a
little, I assume, that Bodies may be mingl’d, and that very durably, that are
not Elementary or resolv’d into Elements or Principles that they may be
mingl’d; as is evident in the Regulus of Colliquated Antimony, and Iron
newly mention’d; and in Gold Coyne, which lasts so many ages; wherein
generally the Gold is alloy’d by the mixture of a quantity, greater or lesser,
(in our Mints they use about a 12th. part) of either silver, or Copper, or
both. Next, I consider, that there being but one Universal matter of things,
as ’tis known that the Aristotelians themselves acknowledge, who call it
Materia Prima (about which nevertheless I like not all their Opinions,) the
Portions of this matter seem to differ from One Another, but in certain
Qualities or Accidents, fewer or more; upon whose Account the Corporeal
Substance they belong to receives its Denomination, and is referr’d to this
or that particular sort of Bodies; so that if it come to lose, or be depriv’d of
those Qualities, though it ceases not to be a body, yet it ceases from being
that kind of Body as a Plant, or Animal; or Red, Green, Sweet, Sowre, or
the like. I consider that it very often happens that the small parts of Bodies
cohere together but by immediate Contact and Rest; and that however, there
are few Bodies whose minute Parts stick so close together, to what cause
soever their Combination be ascrib’d, but that it is possible to meet with
some other Body, whose small Parts may get between them, and so dis-joyn
them; or may be fitted to cohere more strongly with some of them, then
those some do with the rest; or at least may be combin’d so closely with

them, as that neither the Fire, nor the other usual Instruments of Chymical
Anatomies will separate them. These things being promis’d, I will not
peremptorily deny, but that there may be some Clusters of Particles,
wherein the Particles are so minute, and the Coherence so strict, or both,
that when Bodies of Differing Denominations, and consisting of such
durable Clusters, happen to be mingl’d, though the Compound Body made
up of them may be very Differing from either of the Ingredients, yet each of
the little Masses or Clusters may so retain its own Nature, as to be again
separable, such as it was before. As when Gold and Silver being melted
together in a Due Proportion (for in every Proportion, the Refiners will tell
You that the Experiment will not succeed) Aqua Fortis will dissolve the
Silver, and leave the Gold untoucht; by which means, as you lately noted,
both the Metalls may be recover’d from the mixed Mass. But (Continues
Carneades) there are other Clusters wherein the Particles stick not so close
together, but that they may meet with Corpuscles of another Denomination,
which are dispos’d to be more closely United with some of them, then they
were among themselves. And in such case, two thus combining Corpuscles
losing that Shape, or Size, or Motion, or other Accident, upon whose
Account they were endow’d with such a Determinate Quality or Nature,
each of them really ceases to be a Corpuscle of the same Denomination it
was before; and from the Coalition of these there may emerge a new Body,
as really one, as either of the Corpuscles was before they were mingl’d, or,
if you please, Confounded: Since this Concretion is really endow’d with its
own Distinct qualities, and can no more by the Fire, or any other known
way of Analysis, be divided again into the Corpuscles that at first concurr’d
to make it, than either of them could by the same means be subdivided into
other Particles. But (sayes Eleutherius) to make this more intelligible by
particular examples; If you dissolve Copper in Aqua Fortis, or Spirit of
Nitre, (for I remember not which I us’d, nor do I think it much Material)
You may by Crystalizing the Solution Obtain a goodly Vitriol; which
though by Virtue of the Composition it have manifestly diverse Qualities,
not to be met with in either of the Ingredients, yet it seems that the Nitrous
Spirits, or at least many of them, may in this Compounded Mass retain their
former Nature; for having for tryal sake Distill’d this Vitrioll Spirit, there
came over store of Red Fumes, which by that Colour, by their peculiar
stinke, and by their Sourness, manifested themselves to be, Nitrous Spirits;
and that the remaining Calx continu’d Copper, I suppose you’l easily

beleeve. But if you dissolve Minium, which is but Lead Powder’d by the
Fire, in good Spirit of Vinager, and Crystalize the Solution, you shall not
only have a Saccharine Salt exceedingly differing from both its Ingredients;
but the Union of some Parts of the Menstruum with some of those of the
Metal is so strict, that the Spirit of Vinager seems to be, as such, destroy’d,
since the Saline Corpuscles have quite lost that acidity, upon whose
Account the Liquor was call’d Spirit of Vinager; nor can any such Acid
Parts as were put to the Minium be Separated by any known way from the
Saccharum Saturni resulting from them both; for not only there is no
Sowrness at all, but an admirable Sweetness to be tasted in the Concretion;
and not only I found not that Spirit of Wine, which otherwise will
immediately hiss when mingl’d with strong Spirit of Vinager, would hiss
being pour’d upon Saccharum Saturni, wherein yet the Acid Salt of
Vinager, did it Survive, may seem to be concentrated; but upon the
Distillation of Saccharum Saturni by its Self I found indeed a Liquor very
Penetrant, but not at all Acid, and differing as well in smell and other
Qualities, as in tast, from the Spirit of Vinager; which likewise seem’d to
have left some of its Parts very firmly united to the Caput Mortuum, which
though of a Leaden Nature was in smell, Colour, &c. differing from
Minium; which brings into my mind, that though two Powders, the one
Blew, and the other Yellow, may appear a Green mixture, without either of
them losing its own Colour, as a good Microscope has sometimes inform’d
me; yet having mingl’d Minium and Sal Armoniack in a requisite
Proportion, and expos’d them in a Glass Vessel to the Fire, the whole Mass
became White, and the Red Corpuscles were destroy’d; for though the
Calcin’d Lead was separable from the Salt, yet you’l easily beleeve it did
not part from it in the Forme of a Red Powder, such as was the Minium,
when it was put to the Sal Armoniack. I leave it also to be consider’d,
whether in Blood, and divers other Bodies, it be probable, that each of the
Corpuscles that concurr to make a Compound Body doth, though some of
them in some Cases may, retain its own Nature in it, so that Chymsts may
Extricate each sort of them from all the others, wherewith it concurr’d to
make a Body of one Denomination.
I know there may be a Distinction betwixt Matter Immanent, when the
material Parts remain and retain their own Nature in the things materiated,
as some of the Schoolmen speak, (in which sence Wood, Stones and Lime

are the matter of a House,) and Transient, which in the materiated thing is
so alter’d, as to receive a new Forme, without being capable of re-admitting
again the Old. In which sence the Friends of this Distinction say, that Chyle
is the matter of Blood, and Blood that of a Humane Body, of all whose Parts
’tis presum’d to be the Aliment. I know also that it may be said, that of
material Principles, some are common to all mixt Bodies, as Aristotles four
Elements, or the Chymists Tria Prima; others Peculiar, which belong to this
or that sort of Bodies; as Butter and a kind of whey may be said to be the
Proper Principles of Cream: and I deny not, but that these Distinctions may
in some Cases be of Use; but partly by what I have said already, and partly
by what I am to say, You may easily enough guess in what sence I admit
them, and discerne that in such a sence they will either illustrate some of
my Opinions, or at least will not overthrow any of them.
To prosecute then what I was saying before, I will add to this purpose, That
since the Major part of Chymists Credit, what those they call Philosophers
affirme of their Stone, I may represent to them, that though when Common
Gold and Lead are mingled Together, the Lead may be sever’d almost un-
alter’d from the Gold; yet if instead of Gold a Tantillum of the Red Elixir be
mingled with the Saturn, their Union will be so indissoluble in the perfect
Gold that will be produc’d by it, that there is no known, nor perhaps no
possible way of separating the diffus’d Elixir from the fixed Lead, but they
both Constitute a most permanent Body, wherein the Saturne seems to have
quite lost its Properties that made it be call’d Lead, and to have been rather
transmuted by the Elixir, then barely associated to it. So that it seems not
alwayes necessary, that the Bodies that are put together per minima, should
each retain its own Nature; So as when the Mass it Self is dissipated by the
Fire, to be more dispos’d to re-appear in its Pristine Forme, then in any new
one, which by a stricter association of its Parts with those of some of the
other Ingredients of the Compositum, then with one another, it may have
acquired.
And if it be objected, that unless the Hypothesis I oppose be admitted, in
such Cases as I have proposed there would not be an Union but a
Destruction of mingled Bodies, which seems all one as to say, that of such
Bodies there is no mistion at all; I answer, that though the Substances that
are mingl’d remain, only their Accidents are Destroy’d, and though we may
with tollerable Congruity call them Miscibilia, because they are Distinct

Bodies before they are put together, however afterwards they are so
Confounded that I should rather call them Concretions, or Resulting Bodies,
than mixt ones; and though, perhaps, some other and better Account may be
propos’d, upon which the name of mistion may remain; yet if what I have
said be thought Reason, I shall not wrangle about Words, though I think it
fitter to alter a Terme of Art, then reject a new Truth, because it suits not
with it. If it be also Objected that this Notion of mine, concerning mixtion,
though it may be allow’d, when Bodies already Compounded are put to be
mingl’d, yet it is not applicable to those mixtions that are immediately made
of the Elements, or Principles themselves; I Answer in the first place, that I
here Consider the Nature of mixtion somewhat more Generally, then the
Chymists, who yet cannot deny that there are oftentimes Mixtures, and
those very durable ones, made of Bodies that are not Elementary. And in the
next place, that though it may be probably pretended that in those Mixtures
that are made immediately of the Bodies that are call’d Principles or
Elements, the mingl’d Ingredients may better retain their own Nature in the
Compounded Mass, and be more easily separated from thence; yet, besides
that it may be doubted, whether there be any such Primary Bodies, I see not
why the reason I alleadg’d, of the destructibility of the Ingredients of
Bodies in General, may not sometimes be Applicable to Salt Sulphur or
Mercury; ’till it be shewn upon what account we are to believe them
Priviledged. And however, (if you please but to recall to mind, to what
purpose I told you at First, I meant to speak of Mistion at this Time) you
will perhaps allow that what I have hitherto Discoursed about it may not
only give some Light to the Nature of it in general (especially when I shall
have an Opportunity to Declare to you my thoughts on that subject more
fully) but may on some Occasions also be Serviceable to me in the Insuing
Part of this Discourse.
But, to look back Now to that part of our Discourse, whence this Excursion
concerning Mistion has so long diverted us, though we there Deduc’d, from
the differing Substances obtained from a Plant nourished only with Water,
and from some other things, that it was not necessary that nature should
alwaies compound a Body at first of all such differing bodies as the fire
could afterwards make it afford; yet this is not all that may be collected
from those Experiments. For from them there seems also Deducible
something that Subverts an other Foundation of the Chymical Doctrine. For

since that (as we have seen) out of fair Water alone, not only Spirit, but
Oyle, and Salt, and Earth may be Produced; It will follow that Salt and
Sulphur are not Primogeneal Bodies, and principles, since they are every
Day made out of plain Water by the Texture which the Seed or Seminal
principle of plants puts it into. And this would not perhaps seem so strange,
if through pride, or negligence, We were not Wont to Overlook the Obvious
and Familiar Workings of Nature; For if We consider what slight Qualities
they are that serve to denominate one of the Tria Prima, We shall find that
Nature do’s frequently enough work as great Alterations in divers parcells
of matter: For to be readily dissoluble in water, is enough to make the body
that is so, passe for a Salt. And yet I see not why from a new shufling and
Disposition of the Component Particles of a body, it should be much harder
for Nature to compose a body dissoluble in Water, of a portion of Water that
was not so before, then of the Liquid substance of an Egg, which will easily
mix with Water, to produce by the bare warmth of a hatching Hen,
Membrans, Feathers, Tendons, and other parts, that are not dissoluble in
Water as that Liquid Substance was: Nor is the Hardness and Brittleness of
Salt more difficult for Nature to introduce into such a yielding body as
Water, then it is for her to make the Bones of a Chick out of the tender
Substance of the Liquors of an Egg. But instead of prosecuting this
consideration, as I easily might, I will proceed, as soon as I have taken
notice of an objection that lies in my Way. For I easily foresee it will be
alledged, that the above mentioned Examples are all taken from Plants, and
Animals, in whom the Matter is Fashioned by the Plastick power of the
seed, or something analogous thereunto. Whereas the Fire do’s not act like
any of the Seminal Principles, but destroyes them all, when they come
within its Reach. But to this I shall need at present to make but this easy
Answer, That whether it be a Seminal Principle, or any other which
fashions that Matter after those various manners I have mentioned to You,
yet ’tis Evident, that either by the Plastick principle Alone, or that and Heat
Together, or by some Other cause capable to contex the matter, it is yet
possible that the matter may be Anew contriv’d into such Bodies. And ’tis
only for the Possibility of this that I am now contending.

THE

SCEPTICAL CHYMIST.

The Third Part.

W Hat I have hitherto Discours’d, Eleutherius, (sayes his Friend to Him)
has, I presume, shew’n You, that a Considering Man may very well
question the Truth of those very Suppositions which Chymists as well as
Peripateticks, without proving, take for granted; and upon which Depends
the Validity of the Inferences they draw from their Experiments. Wherefore
having dispach’t that, which though a Chymist Perhaps will not, yet I do,
look upon as the most Important, as well as Difficult, part of my Task, it
will now be Seasonable for me to proceed to the Consideration of the
Experiments themselves, wherein they are wont so much to Triumph and
Glory. And these will the rather deserve a serious Examination, because
those that Alledge them are wont to do it with so much Confidence and
Ostentation, that they have hitherto impos’d upon almost all Persons,
without excepting Philosophers and Physitians themselves, who have read
their Books, or heard them talk. For some learned Men have been content
rather to beleeve what they so boldly Affirm, then be at the trouble and
charge, to try whether or no it be True. Others again, who have Curiosity
enough to Examine the Truth of what is Averr’d, want Skill and
Opportunity to do what they Desire. And the Generality even of Learned
Men, seeing the Chymists (not contenting themselves with the Schools to
amuse the World with empty words) Actually Perform’d divers strange
things, and, among those Resolve Compound Bodies into several
Substances not known by former Philosophers to be contain’d in them: Men
I say, seeing these Things, and Hearing with what Confidence Chymists
Averr the Substances Obtain’d from Compound Bodies by the Fire to be the
True Elements, or, (as they speak) Hypostaticall Principles of them, are
forward to think it but Just as well as Modest, that according to the
Logicians Rule, the Skilfull Artists should be Credited in their own Art;
Especially when those things whose Nature they so Confidently take upon
them to teach others are not only Productions of their own Skill, but such as
others Know not else what to make of.

But though (Continues Carneades) the Chymists have been able upon some
or other of the mention’d Acounts, not only to Delight but Amaze, and
almost to bewitch even Learned Men; yet such as You and I, who are not
unpractis’d in the Trade, must not suffer our Selves to be impos’d upon by
hard Names, or bold Assertions; nor to be dazl’d by that Light which should
but assist us to discern things the more clearly. It is one thing to be able to
help Nature to produce things, and another thing to Understand well the
Nature of the things produc’d. As we see, that many Persons that can beget
Children, are for all that as Ignorant of the Number and Nature of the parts,
especially the internal ones, that Constitute a Childs Body, as they that
never were Parents. Nor do I Doubt, but you’l excuse me, if as I thank the
Chymists for the things their Analysis shews me, so I take the Liberty to
consider how many, and what they are, without being astonish’d at them; as
if, whosoever hath Skill enough to shew men some new thing of his own
making, had the Right to make them believe whatsoever he pleases to tell
them concerning it.
Wherefore I will now proceed to my Third General Consideration, which is,
That it does not appear, that Three is precisely and Universally the Number
of the Distinct Substances or Elements, whereinto mixt Bodies are resoluble
by the Fire; I mean that ’tis not prov’d by Chymists, that all the Compound
Bodies, which are granted to be perfectly mixt, are upon their Chymical
Analysis divisible each of them into just Three Distinct Substances, neither
more nor less, which are wont to be lookt upon as Elementary, or may as
well be reputed so as those that are so reputed. Which last Clause I
subjoyne, to prevent your Objecting, that some of the Substances I may
have occasion to mention by and by, are not perfectly Homogeneous, nor
Consequently worthy of the name of Principles. For that which I am now to
consider, is, into how many Differing Substances, that may plausibly pass
for the Elementary Ingredients of a mix’d Body, it may be Analyz’d by the
Fire; but whether each of these be un-compounded, I reserve to examine,
when I shall come to the next General Consideration; where I hope to
evince, that the Substances which the Chymists not only allow, but assert to
be the Component Principles of the Body resolv’d into them, are not wont
to be uncompounded.
Now there are two Kind of Arguments (pursues Carneades) which may be
brought to make my Third Proposition seem probable; one sort of them

being of a more Speculative Nature, and the other drawn from Experience.
To begin then with the first of these.
But as Carneades was going to do as he had said, Eleutherius interrupted
him, by saying with a somewhat smiling countenance;
If you have no mind I should think, that the Proverb, That Good Wits have
bad Memories, is Rational and Applicable to You, You must not Forget now
you are upon the Speculative Considerations, that may relate to the Number
of the Elements; that your Self did not long since Deliver and Concede
some Propositions in Favour of the Chymical Doctrine, which I may
without disparagement to you think it uneasie, even for Carneades to
answer.
I have not, replies he, Forgot the Concessions you mean; but I hope too, that
you have not forgot neither with what Cautions they were made, when I had
not yet assumed the Person I am now sustaining. But however, I shall to
content You, so discourse of my Third general consideration, as to let You
see, That I am not Unmindful of the things you would have me remember.
To talk then again according to such principles as I then made use of, I shall
represent, that if it be granted rational to suppose, as I then did, that the
Elements consisted at first of certain small and primary Coalitions of the
minute Particles of matter into Corpuscles very numerous, and very like
each other, It will not be absurd to conceive, that such primary Clusters may
be of far more sorts then three or five; and consequently, that we need not
suppose, that in each of the compound Bodies we are treating of there
should be found just three sorts of such primitive Coalitions, as we are
speaking of.
And if according to this Notion we allow a considerable number of differing
Elements, I may add, that it seems very possible, that to the constitution of
one sort of mixt Bodies two kinds of Elementary ones may suffice (as I
lately Exemplify’d to you, in that most durable Concrete, Glass,) another
sort of Mixts may be compos’d of three Elements, another of four, another
of five, and another perhaps of many more. So that according to this
Notion, there can be no determinate number assign’d, as that of the
Elements; of all sorts of compound Bodies whatsoever, it being very
probable that some Concretes consist of fewer, some of more Elements.

Nay, it does not seem Impossible, according to these Principles, but that
there may be two sorts of Mixts, whereof the one may not have any of all
the same Elements as the other consists of; as we oftentimes see two words,
whereof the one has not any one of the Letters to be met with in the other;
or as we often meet with diverse Electuaries, in which no Ingredient (except
Sugar) is common to any two of them. I will not here debate whether there
may not be a multitude of these Corpuscles, which by reason of their being
primary and simple, might be called Elementary, if several sorts of them
should convene to compose any Body, which are as yet free, and neither as
yet contex’d and entangl’d with primary Corpuscles of other kinds, but
remains liable to be subdu’d and fashion’d by Seminal Principles, or the
like powerful and Transmuting Agent, by whom they may be so connected
among themselves, or with the parts of one of the bodies, as to make the
compound Bodies, whose Ingredients they are, resoluble into more, or other
Elements then those that Chymists have hitherto taken notice of.
To all which I may add, that since it appears, by what I observ’d to you of
the permanency of Gold and Silver, that even Corpuscles that are not of an
Elementary but compounded Nature, may be of so durable a Texture, as to
remain indissoluble in the ordinary Analysis that Chymists make of Bodies
by the Fire; ’Tis not impossible but that, though there were but three
Elements, yet there may be a greater number of Bodies, which the wonted
wayes of Anatomy will not discover to be no Elementary Bodies.
But, sayes Carneades, having thus far, in compliance to you, talk’t
conjecturally of the number of the Elements, ’tis now time to consider, not
of how many Elements it is possible that Nature may compound mix’d
Bodies, but (at least as farr as the ordinary Experiments of Chymists will
informe us) of how many she doth make them up.
I say then, that it does not by these sufficiently appear to me, that there is
any one determinate number of Elements to be uniformly met with in all the
several sorts of Bodies allow’d to be perfectly mixt.
And for the more distinct proof of this Proposition, I shall in the first place
Represent, That there are divers Bodies, which I could never see by fire
divided into so many as three Elementary substances. I would fain (as I said
lately to Philoponus) see that fixt and noble Metal we call Gold separated

into Salt, Sulphur and Mercury: and if any man will submit to a competent
forfeiture in case of failing, I shall willingly in case of prosperous successe
pay both for the Materials and the charges of such an Experiment. ’Tis not,
that after what I have try’d my self I dare peremptorily deny, that there may
out of Gold be extracted a certain substance, which I cannot hinder
Chymists from calling its Tincture or Sulphur; and which leaves the
remaining Body depriv’d of its wonted colour. Nor am I sure, that there
cannot be drawn out of the same Metal a real quick and running Mercury.
But for the Salt of Gold, I never could either see it, or be satisfied that there
was ever such a thing separated, in rerum natura, by the relation of any
credible eye witnesse. And for the several Processes that Promise that
effect, the materials that must be wrought upon are somewhat too pretious
and costly to be wasted upon so groundlesse adventures, of which not only
the successe is doubtful, but the very possibility is not yet demonstrated. Yet
that which most deterres me from such tryalls, is not their chargeablenesse,
but their unsatisfactorinesse, though they should succeed. For the Extraction
of this golden Salt being in Chymists Processes prescribed to be effected by
corrosive Menstruums, or the Intervention of other Saline Bodies, it will
remain doubtful to a wary person, whether the Emergent Salt be that of the
Gold it self; or of the Saline Bodies or Spirits employ’d to prepare it; For
that such disguises of Metals do often impose upon Artists, I am sure
Eleutherius is not so much a stranger to Chymistry as to ignore. I would
likewise willingly see the three principles separated from the pure sort of
Virgin-Sand, from Osteocolla, from refined Silver, from Quicksilver, freed
from its adventitious Sulphur, from Venetian Talk, which by long detention
in an extreme Reverberium, I could but divide into smaller Particles, (not
the constituent principles,) Nay, which, when I caused it to be kept, I know
not how long, in a Glasse-house fire, came out in the Figure it’s Lumps had
when put in, though alter’d to an almost Amethystine colour; and from
divers other Bodies, which it were now unnecessary to enumerate. For
though I dare not absolutely affirme it to be impossible to Analyze these
Bodies into their Tria Prima; yet because, neither my own Experiments, nor
any competent Testimony hath hitherto either taught me how such an
Analysis may be made, or satisfy’d me, that it hath been so, I must take the
Liberty to refrain from believing it, till the Chymists prove it, or give us
intelligible and practicable Processes to performe what they pretend. For
whilst they affect that Ænigmatical obscurity with which they are wont to

puzzle the Readers of their divulg’d Processes concerning the Analyticall
Preparation of Gold or Mercury, they leave wary persons much unsatisfyed
whether or no the differing Substances, they promise to produce, be truly
the Hypostatical Principles, or only some intermixtures of the divided
Bodies with those employ’d to work upon them, as is Evident in the
seeming Crystalls of Silver, and those of Mercury; which though by some
inconsiderately supposed to be the Salts of those Metalls, are plainly but
mixtures of the Metalline Bodies, with the Saline parts of Aqua fortis or
other corrosive Liquors; as is evident by their being reducible into Silver or
Quicksilver, as they were before.
I cannot but Confesse (saith Eleutherius) that though Chymists may upon
probable grounds affirm themselves Able to obtain their Tria Prima, from
Animals and Vegetables, yet I have often wondred that they should so
confidently pretend also to resolve all Metalline and other Mineral bodies
into Salt, Sulphur, and Mercury. For ’tis a saying almost Proverbial, among
those Chymists themselves that are accounted Philosophers; and our famous
Countryman Roger Bacon has particularly adopted it; that Facilius est
aurum facere quam destruere. And I fear, with You, that Gold is not the
only Mineral from which Chymists are wont fruitlessly to attempt the
separating of their three Principles. I know indeed (continues Eleutherius)
that the Learned Sennertus, Sennert. lib. de cons. & dissens. pag. 147. even in that
book where he takes not upon him to play the Advocate for the Chymists,
but the Umpier betwixt them and the Peripateticks, expresses himself
roundly, thus; Salem omnibus inesse (mixtis scilicet) & ex iis fieri posse
omnibus in resolutionibus Chymicis versatis notissimum est. And in the next
Page, Quod de sale dixi, saies he, Idem de Sulphure dici potest: but by his
favour I must see very good proofs, before I believe such general
Assertions, how boldly soever made; and he that would convince me of
their truth, must first teach me some true and practicable way of separating
Salt and Sulphur from Gold, Silver, and those many different sort of Stones,
that a violent Fire does not bring to Lime, but to Fusion; and not only I, for
my own part, never saw any of those newly nam’d Bodies so resolved; but
Helmont, Helmon. pag. 409. who was much better vers’d in the Chymical
Anatomizing of Bodies then either Sennertus or I, has somewhere this
resolute passage; Scio (saies he) ex arena, silicibus & saxis, non Calcariis,
nunquam Sulphur aut Mercurium trahi posse; Nay Quercetanus Quercet. apud

Billich. in Thessalo redivivo. pag. 99. himself, though the grand stickler for the Tria
Prima, has this Confession of the Irresolubleness of Diamonds; Adamas
(saith he) omnium factus Lapidum solidissimus ac durissimus ex arctissima
videlicet trium principiorum unione ac Cohærentia, quæ nulla arte
separationis in solutionem principiorum suorum spiritualium disjungi
potest. And indeed, pursues Eleutherius, I was not only glad, but somewhat
surprized to find you inclined to Admit that there may be a Sulphur and a
running Mercury drawn from Gold; for unlesse you do (as your expression
seem’d to intimate) take the word Sulphur in a very loose sence, I must
doubt whether our Chymists can separate a Sulphur from Gold: For when I
saw you make the experiment that I suppose invited you to speak as you
did, I did not judge the golden Tincture to be the true principle of Sulphur
extracted from the body, but an aggregate of some such highly colour’d
parts of the Gold, as a Chymist would have called a Sulphur incombustible,
which in plain English seems to be little better than to call it a Sulphur and
no Sulphur. And as for Metalline Mercuries, I had not wondred at it, though
you had expressed much more severity in speaking of them: For I
remember that having once met an old and famous Artist, who had long
been (and still is) Chymist to a great Monarch, the repute he had of a very
honest man invited me to desire him to tell me ingenuously whether or no,
among his many labours, he had ever really extracted a true and running
Mercury out of Metalls; to which question he freely replyed, that he had
never separated a true Mercury from any Metal; nor had ever seen it really
done by any man else. And though Gold is, of all Metalls, That, whose
Mercury Chymists have most endeavoured to extract, and which they do the
most brag they have extracted; yet the Experienced Angelus Sala, in his
Spagyrical account of the seven Terrestrial Planets (that is the seven
metalls) affords us this memorable Testimony, to, our present purpose;
Quanquam (saies he) &c. experientia tamen (quam stultorum Magistrum
vocamus) certe Comprobavit, Mercurium auri adeo fixum, maturum, &
arcte cum reliquis ejusdem corporis substantiis conjungi, ut nullo modo
retrogredi possit. To which he sub-joynes, that he himself had seen much
Labour spent upon that Design, but could never see any such Mercury
produc’d thereby. And I easily beleeve what he annexes; that he had often
seen Detected many tricks and Impostures of Cheating Alchymists. For, the
most part of those that are fond of such Charlatans, being unskilfull or
Credulous, or both, ’tis very easie for such as have some Skill, much craft,

more boldness, and no Conscience, to impose upon them; and therefore,
though many profess’d Alchymists, and divers Persons of Quality have told
me that they have made or seen the Mercury of Gold, or of this or that other
Metal; yet I have been still apt to fear that either these persons have had a
Design to deceive others; or have not had Skill and circumspection enough
to keep themselves from being deceived.
You recall to my mind (sayes Carneades) a certain Experiment I once
devis’d, innocently to deceive some persons, and let them and others see
how little is to be built upon the affirmation of those that are either
unskillfull or unwary, when they tell us they have seen Alchymists make the
Mercury of this or that Metal; and to make this the more evident, I made my
Experiment much more Slight, Short and Simple, than the Chymists usuall
processes to Extract Metalline Mercuries; which Operations being
commonly more Elaborate and Intricate, and requiring a much more longer
time, give the Alchymists a greater opportunity to Cozen, and Consequently
are more Obnoxious to the Spectators suspicion. And that wherein I
endeavour’d to make my Experiment look the more like a True Analysis,
was, that I not only pretended as well as others to extract a Mercury from
the Metal I wrought upon, but likewise to separate a large proportion of
manifest and inflamable Sulphur. I take then, of the filings of Copper, about
a Drachme or two, of common sublimate, powder’d, the like Weight, and
Sal Armoniack near about as much as of Sublimate; these three being well
mingl’d together I put into a small Vial with a long neck, or, which I find
better, into a Glass Urinall, which (having first stopped it with Cotton) to
avoid the Noxious Fumes, I approach by degrees to a competent Fire of
well kindled coals, or (which looks better, but more endangers the Glass) to
the Flame of a candle; and after a while the bottom of the Glass being held
Just upon the Kindled Coals, or in the flame, You may in about a quarter of
an Hour, or perchance in halfe that time, perceive in the Bottom of the
Glass some running Mercury; and if then You take away the Glass and
break it, You shall find a Parcel of Quicksilver, Perhaps altogether, and
perhaps part of it in the pores of the Solid Mass; You shall find too, that the
remaining Lump being held to the Flame of the Candle will readily burn
with a greenish Flame, and after a little while (perchance presently) will in
the Air Acquire a Greenish Blew, which being the Colour that is ascrib’d to
Copper, when its Body is unlocked, ’Tis easie to perswade Men that this is

the True Sulphur of Venus, especially since not only the Salts may be
Suppos’d partly to be Flown away, and partly to be Sublim’d to the upper
part of the Glass, whose inside (will Commonly appear Whitened by them)
but the Metal seems to be quite Destroy’d, the Copper no longer appearing
in a Metalline Forme, but almost in that of a Resinous Lump; whereas
indeed the Case is only this, That the Saline parts of the Sublimate, together
with the Sal Armoniack, being excited and actuated by the Vehement heat,
fall upon the Copper, (which is a Metal they can more easily corrode, than
silver) whereby the small parts of the Mercury being freed from the Salts
that kept them asunder, and being by the heat tumbled up and down after
many Occursions, they Convene into a Conspicuous Mass of Liquor; and as
for the Salts, some of the more Volatile of them Subliming to the upper part
of the Glass, the others Corrode the Copper, and uniting themselves with it
do strangely alter and Disguise its Metallick Form, and compose with it a
new kind of Concrete inflamable like Sulphur; concerning which I shall not
now say any thing, since I can Referr You to the Diligent Observations
which I remember Mr. Boyle has made concerning this Odde kind of
Verdigrease. But Continues Carneades smiling, you know I was not cut out
for a Mountebank, and therefore I will hasten to resume the person of a
Sceptick, and take up my discourse where You diverted me from
prosecuting it.
In the next place, then, I consider, that, as there are some Bodies which
yield not so many as the three Principles; so there are many others, that in
their Resolution Exhibite more principles than three; and that therefore the
Ternary Number is not that of the Universal and Adequate Principles of
Bodies. If you allow of the Discourse I ately made You, touching the
primary Associations of the small Particles of matter, You will scarce think
it improbable, that of such Elementary Corpuscles there may be more sorts
then either three, or four, or five. And if you will grant, what will scarce be
deny’d, that Corpuscles of a compounded Nature may in all the wonted
Examples of Chymists pass for Elementary, I see not, why you should think
it impossible, that as Aqua Fortis, or Aqua Regis will make a Separation of
colliquated Silver and Gold, though the Fire cannot; so there may be some
Agent found out so subtile and so powerfull, at least in respect of those
particular compounded Corpuscles, as to be able to resolve them into those
more simple ones, whereof they consist, and consequently encrease the

number of the Distinct Substances, whereinto the mixt Body has been
hitherto thought resoluble. And if that be true, which I recited to you a
while ago out of Helmont concerning the Operations of the Alkahest, which
divides Bodies into other Distinct Substances, both as to number and
Nature, then the Fire does; it will not a little countenance my Conjecture.
But confining our selves to such wayes of Analyzing mix’d Bodies, as are
already not unknown to Chymists, it may without Absurdity be Question’d,
whether besides those grosser Elements of Bodies, which they call Salt
Sulphur and Mercury, there may not be Ingredients of a more Subtile
Nature, which being extreamly little, and not being in themselves Visible,
may escape unheeded at the Junctures of the Destillatory Vessels, though
never so carefully Luted. For let me observe to you one thing, which though
not taken notice of by Chymists, may be a notion of good Use in divers
Cases to a Naturalist, that we may well suspect, that there may be severall
Sorts of Bodies, which are not Immediate Objects of any one of our senses;
since we See, that not only those little Corpuscles that issue out of the
Loadstone, and perform the Wonders for which it is justly admired; But the
Effluviums of Amber, Jet, and other Electricall Concretes, though by their
effects upon the particular Bodies dispos’d to receive their Action, they
seem to fall under the Cognizance of our Sight, yet do they not as Electrical
immediately Affect any of our senses, as do the bodies, whether minute or
greater, that we See, Feel, Taste, &c. But, continues Carneades, because
you may expect I should, as the Chymists do, consider only the sensible
Ingredients of Mixt Bodies, let us now see, what Experience will, even as to
these, suggest to us.
It seems then questionable enough, whether from Grapes variously order’d
there may not be drawn more distinct Substances by the help of the Fire,
then from most other mixt Bodies. For the Grapes themselves being dryed
into Raysins and distill’d, will (besides Alcali, Phlegm, and Earth) yield a
considerable quantity of an Empyreumatical Oyle, and a Spirit of a very
different nature from that of Wine. Also the unfermented Juice of Grapes
affords other distil’d Liquors then Wine doth. The Juice of Grapes after
fermentation will yield a Spiritus Ardens; which if competently rectifyed
will all burn away without leaving any thing remaining. The same
fermented Juice degenerating into Vinager, yields an acid and corroding
Spirit. The same Juice turn’d up, armes it self with Tartar; out of which may

be separated, as out of other Bodies, Phlegme, Spirit, Oyle, Salt and Earth:
not to mention what Substances may be drawn from the Vine it self,
probably differing from those which are separated from Tartar, which is a
body by it self, that has few resemblers in the World. And I will further
consider that what force soever you will allow this instance, to evince that
there are some Bodies that yield more Elements then others, it can scarce be
deny’d but that the Major part of bodies that are divisible into Elements,
yield more then three. For, besides those which the Chymists are pleased to
name Hypostatical, most bodies contain two others, Phlegme and Earth,
which concurring as well as the rest to the constitution of Mixts, and being
as generally, if not more, found in their Analysis, I see no sufficient cause
why they should be excluded from the number of Elements. Nor will it
suffice to object, as the Paracelsians are wont to do, that the Tria prima are
the most useful Elements, and the Earth and Water but worthlesse and
unactive; for Elements being call’d so in relation to the constituting of mixt
Bodies, it should be upon the account of its Ingrediency, not of its use, that
any thing should be affirmed or denyed to be an Element: and as for the
pretended uselessness of Earth and Water, it would be consider’d that
usefulnesse, or the want of it, denotes only a Respect or Relation to us; and
therefore the presence, or absence of it, alters not the Intrinsick nature of the
thing. The hurtful Teeth of Vipers are for ought I know useless to us, and
yet are not to be deny’d to be parts of their Bodies; and it were hard to shew
of(186) what greater Use to Us, then Phlegme and Earth, are those
Undiscern’d Stars, which our New Telescopes discover to Us, in many
Blanched places of the Sky; and yet we cannot but acknowledge them
Constituent and Considerably great parts of the Universe. Besides that
whether or no the Phlegme and Earth be immediately Useful, but necessary
to constitute the Body whence they are separated; and consequently, if the
mixt Body be not Useless to us, those constituent parts, without which it
could not have been That mixt Body, may be said not to be Unuseful to Us:
and though the Earth and Water be not so conspicuously Operative (after
separation) as the other three more active Principles, yet in this case it will
not be amiss to remember the lucky Fable of Menemius Aggrippa, of the
dangerous Sedition of the Hands and Legs, and other more busie parts of
the Body, against the seemingly unactive Stomack. And to this case also we
may not unfitly apply that Reasoning of an Apostle, to another purpose; If
the Ear shall say, because I Am not the Eye, I am not of the Body; Is it

therefore not of the Body? If the whole(187) Body were Eye, where were the
Hearing? If the whole were for hearing, where the smelling? In a word,
since Earth and water appear, as clearly and as generally as the other
Principles upon the resolution of Bodies, to be the Ingredients whereof they
are made up; and since they are useful, if not immediately to us, or rather to
Physitians, to the Bodies they constitute, and so though in somewhat a
remoter way, are serviceable to us; to exclude them out of the number of
Elements, is not to imitate Nature.

Transcriber’s Note: See the printer’s note for material that
the printer inadvertently omitted from this page.

But, pursues Carneades, though I think it Evident, that Earth and Phlegme
are to be reckon’d among the Elements of most Animal and Vegetable
Bodies, yet ’tis not upon that Account alone, that I think divers Bodies
resoluble into more Substances then three. For there are two Experiments,
that I have sometimes made to shew, that at least some Mixts are divisible
into more Distinct Substances then five. The one of these Experiments,
though ’twill be more seasonable for me to mention it fully anon, yet in the
mean time, I shall tell you thus much of it, That out of two Distill’d
Liquors, which pass for Elements of the Bodies whence they are drawn, I
can without Addition make a true Yellow and Inflamable Sulphur,
notwithstanding that the two Liquors remain afterwards Distinct. Of the
other Experiment, which perhaps will not be altogether unworthy your
Notice, I must now give you this particular Account. I had long observ’d,
that by the Destillation of divers Woods, both in Ordinary, and some
unusuall sorts of Vessels, the Copious Spirit that came over, had besides a
strong tast, to be met with in the Empyreumaticall Spirits of many other
Bodies, an Acidity almost like that of Vinager: Wherefore I suspected, that
though the sowrish Liquor Distill’d, for Instance, from Box-Wood, be lookt
upon by Chymists as barely the Spirit of it, and therefore as one single
Element or Principle; yet it does really consist of two Differing Substances,
and may be divisible into them; and consequently, that such Woods and
other Mixts as abound with such a Vinager, may be said to consist of one
Element or Principle, more then the Chymists as yet are Aware of;
Wherefore bethinking my self, how the separation of these two Spirits
might be made, I Quickly found, that there were several wayes of

Compassing it. But that of them which I shall at present mention, was this,
Having Destill’d a Quantity of Box-Wood per se, and slowly rectify’d the
sowrish Spirit, the better to free it both from Oyle and Phlegme, I cast into
this Rectify’d Liquor a convenient Quantity of Powder’d Coral, expecting
that the Acid part of the Liquor would Corrode the Coral, and being
associated with it would be so retain’d by it, that the other part of the
Liquor, which was not of an acid Nature, nor fit to fasten upon the Corals,
would be permitted to ascend alone. Nor was I deceiv’d in my Expectation;
For having gently abstracted the Liquor from the Coralls, there came over a
Spirit of a Strong smell, and of a tast very piercing, but without any
sourness; and which was in diverse qualities manifestly different, not only
from a Spirit of Vinager, but from some Spirit of the same Wood, that I
purposely kept by me without depriving it of its acid Ingredient. And to
satisfy you, that these two Substances were of a very differing Nature, I
might informe you of several Tryals that I made, but must not name some of
them, because I cannot do so without making some unseasonable
discoveries. Yet this I shall tell you at present, that the sowre Spirit of Box,
not only would, as I just now related, dissolve Corals, which the other
would not fasten on, but being pour’d upon Salt of Tartar would
immediately boile and hiss, whereas the other would lye quietly upon it.
The acid Spirit pour’d upon Minium made a Sugar of Lead, which I did not
find the other to do; some drops of this penetrant spirit being mingl’d with
some drops of the blew Syrup of Violets seem’d rather to dilute then
otherwise alter the colour; whereas the Acid Spirit turn’d the syrup of a
reddish colour, and would probably have made it of as pure a red as Acid
Salts are wont to do, had not its operation been hindered by the mixture of
the other Spirit. A few drops of the compound Spirit being Shaken into a
pretty quantity of the infusion of Lignum Nephriticum, presently destroyed
all the blewish colour, whereas the other Spirit would not take it away. To
all which it might be added, that having for tryals sake pour’d fair water
upon the Corals that remained in the bottom of the glass wherein I had
rectifyed the double spirit (if I may so call it) that was first drawn from the
Box, I found according to my expectation that the Acid Spirit had really
dissolved the Corals, and had coagulated with them. For by the affusion of
fair Water, I Obtain’d a Solution, which (to note that singularity upon the
bye) was red, whence the Water being evaporated, there remained a soluble
Substance much like the Ordinary Salt of Coral, as Chymists are pleas’d to

call that Magistery of Corals, which they make by dissolving them in
common spirit of Vinager, and abstracting the Menstruum ad Siccitatem. I
know not whether I should subjoine, on this occasion, that the simple spirit
of Box, if Chymists will have it therefore Saline because it has a strong tast,
will furnish us with a new kind of Saline Bodies, differing from those
hitherto taken notice of. For whereas of the three chief sorts of Salts, the
Acid, the Alcalizate, and the Sulphureous, there is none that seems to be
friends with both the other two, as I may, e’re it be long, have occasion to
shew; I did not find but that the simple spirit of Box did agree very well (at
least as farr as I had occasion to try it) both with the Acid and the other
Salts. For though it would lye very quiet with salt of Tartar, Spirit of Urine,
or other bodies, whose Salts were either of an Alcalizate or fugitive Nature;
yet did not the mingling of Oyle of Vitriol it self produce any hissing or
Effervescence, which you know is wont to ensue upon the Affusion of that
highly Acid Liquor upon either of the Bodies newly mentioned.
I think my self, sayes Eleutherius, beholden to you, for this Experiment; not
only because I forsee you will make it helpful to you in the Enquiry you are
now upon, but because it teaches us a Method, whereby we may prepare a
numerous sort of new spirits, which though more simple then any that are
thought Elementary, are manifestly endow’d with peculiar and powerfull
qualities, some of which may probably be of considerable use in Physick, as
well alone, as associated with other things; as one may hopefully guess by
the redness of that Solution your sour Spirit made of Corals, and by some
other circumstances of your Narrative. And suppose (pursues Eleutherius)
that you are not so confin’d, for the separation of the Acid parts of these
compound Spirits from the other, to employ Corals; but that you may as
well make use of any Alcalizate Salt, or of Pearls, or Crabs eyes, or any
other Body, upon which common Spirit of Vinager will easily work, and, to
speak in an Helmontian Phrase, Exantlate it self.
I have not yet tryed, sayes Carneades, of what use the mention’d liquors
may be in Physick, either as Medicines or as Menstruums: But I could
mention now (and may another time) divers of the tryals that I made to
satisfy my self of the difference of these two Liquors. But that, as I allow
your thinking what you newly told me about Corals, I presume you will
allow me, from what I have said already, to deduce this Corollary; That
there are divers compound bodies, which may be resolv’d into four such

differing Substances, as may as well merit the name of Principles, as those
to which the Chymists freely give it. For since they scruple not to reckon
that which I call the compound Spirit of Box, for the spirit, or as others
would have it, the Mercury of that Wood, I see not, why the Acid liquor,
and the other, should not each of them, especially that last named, be lookt
upon as more worthy to be called an Elementary Principle; since it must
needs be of a more simple nature then the Liquor, which was found to be
divisible into that, and the Acid Spirit. And this further use (continues
Carneades) may be made of our experiment to my present purpose, that it
may give us a rise to suspect, that since a Liquor reputed by the Chymists to
be, without dispute, Homogeneous, is by so slight a way divisible into two
distinct and more simple Ingredients, some more skilful or happier
Experimenter then I may find a way either further to divide one of these
Spirits, or to resolve some or other, if not all, of those other Ingredients of
mixt Bodies, that have hitherto pass’d among Chymists for their Elements
or Principles.

THE

SCEPTICAL CHYMIST.

The Fourth Part.

A Nd thus much (sayes Carneades) may suffice to be said of the Number
of the Distinct substances separable from mixt Bodies by the Fire:
Wherefore I now proceed to consider the nature of them, and shew you,
That though they seem Homogeneous Bodies, yet have they not the purity
and simplicity that is requisite to Elements. And I should immediately
proceed to the proof of my Assertion, but that the Confidence wherewith
Chymists are wont to call each of the Substances we speak of by the name
of Sulphur or Mercury, or the other of the Hypostaticall Principles, and the
intollerabln Ambiguity they allow themselves ie their Writings and
Expressions, makes it necessary for me in Order to the Keeping you either
from mistaking me, or thinking I mistake the Controversie, to take Notice to
you and complain of the unreasonable Liberty they give themselves of
playing with Names at pleasure. And indeed if I were oblig’d in this
Dispute, to have such regard to the Phraseology of each particular Chymist,
as not to Write any thing which this or that Author may not pretend, not to
contradict this or that sence, which he may give as Occasion serves to his
Ambiguous Expressions, I should scarce know how to dispute, nor which
way to turn myself. For I find that even Eminent Writers, (such as Raymund
Lully, Paracelsus and others) do so abuse the termes they employ, that as
they will now and then give divers things, one name; so they will
oftentimes give one thing, many Names; and some of them (perhaps) such,
as do much more properly signifie some Distinct Body of another kind; nay
even in Technical Words or Termes of Art, they refrain not from this
Confounding Liberty; but will, as I have Observ’d, call the same Substance,
sometimes the Sulphur, and Sometimes the Mercury of a Body. And now I
speak of Mercury, I cannot but take Notice, that the Descriptions they give
us of that Principle or Ingredient of mixt Bodies, are so intricate, that even
those that have Endeavour’d to Pollish and Illustrate the Notions of the
Chymists, are fain to confess that they know not what to make of it, either
by Ingenuous Acknowledgments, or Descriptions that are not Intelligible.

I must confess (sayes Eleutherius) I have, in the reading of Paracelsus and
other Chymical Authors, been troubled to find, that such hard Words and
Equivocal Expressions, as You justly complain of, do even when they treat
of Principles, seem to be studiously affected by those Writers; whether to
make themselves to be admir’d by their Readers, and their Art appear more
Venerable and Mysterious, or, (as they would have us think) to conceal
from them a Knowledge themselves judge inestimable.
But whatever (sayes Carneades) these Men may promise themselves from a
Canting way of delivering the Principles of Nature, they will find the Major
part of Knowing Men so vain, as when they understand not what they read,
to conclude, that it is rather the Writers fault then their own. And those that
are so ambitious to be admir’d by the Vulgar, that rather then go without the
Admiration of the Ignorant they will expose themselves to the contempt of
the Learned, those shall, by my consent, freely enjoy their Option. As for
the Mystical Writers scrupling to Communicate their Knowledge, they
might less to their own Disparagement, and to the trouble of their Readers,
have conceal’d it by writing no Books, then by Writing bad ones. If
Themistius were here, he would not stick to say, that Chymists write thus
darkly, not because they think their Notions too precious to be explain’d,
but because they fear that if they were explain’d, men would discern, that
they are farr from being precious. And indeed, I fear that the chief Reason
why Chymists have written so obscurely of their three Principles, may be,
That not having Clear and Distinct Notions of them themselves, they cannot
write otherwise then Confusedly of what they but Confusedly Apprehend:
Not to say that divers of them, being Conscious to the Invalidity of their
Doctrine, might well enough discerne that they could scarce keep
themselves from being confuted, but by keeping themselves from being
clearly understood. But though much may be said to Excuse the Chymists
when they write Darkly, and Ænigmatically, about the Preparation of their
Elixir, and Some few other grand Arcana, the divulging of which they may
upon Grounds Plausible enough esteem unfit; yet when they pretend to
teach the General Principles of Natural Philosophers, this Equivocall Way
of Writing is not to be endur’d. For in such Speculative Enquiries, where
the naked Knowledge of the Truth is the thing Principally aim’d at, what
does he teach me worth thanks that does not, if he can, make his Notion
intelligible to me, but by Mystical Termes, and Ambiguous Phrases darkens

what he should clear up; and makes me add the Trouble of guessing at the
sence of what he Equivocally expresses, to that of examining the Truth of
what he seems to deliver. And if the matter of the Philosophers Stone, and
the manner of preparing it, be such Mysteries as they would have the World
believe them, they may Write Intelligibly and Clearly of the Principles of
mixt Bodies in General, without Discovering what they call the Great Work.
But for my part (Continues Carneades) what my Indignation at this Un-
philosophical way of teaching Principles has now extorted from me, is
meant chiefly to excuse my self, if I shall hereafter oppose any Particular
Opinion or assertion, that some Follower of Paracelsus or any Eminent
Artist may pretend not to be his Masters. For, as I told you long since, I am
not Oblig’d to examine private mens writings, (which were a Labour as
endless as unprofitable) being only engag’d to examine those Opinions
about the Tria Prima, which I find those Chymists I have met with to agree
in most: And I Doubt not but my Arguments against their Doctrine will be
in great part easily enough applicable ev’n to those private Opinions, which
they do not so directly and expresly oppose. And indeed, that which I am
now entering upon being the Consideration of the things themselves
whereinto Spagyrists resolve mixt Bodies by the Fire, If I can shew that
these are not of an Elementary Nature, it will be no great matter what names
these or those Chymists have been pleased to give them. And I question not
that to a Wise man, and consequently to Eleutherius, it will be lesse
considerable to know, what Men Have thought of Things, then what they
Should have thought.
In the fourth and last place, then, I consider, that as generally as Chymists
are wont to appeal to Experience, and as confidently as they use to instance
the several substances separated by the Fire from a Mixt Body, as a
sufficient proof of their being its component Elements: Yet those differing
Substances are many of them farr enough from Elementary simplicity, and
may be yet look’d upon as mixt Bodies, most of them also retaining,
somewhat at least, if not very much, of the Nature of those Concretes
whence they were forc’d.
I am glad (sayes Eleutherius) to see the Vanity or Envy of the canting
Chymists thus discover’d and chastis’d; and I could wish, that Learned Men
would conspire together to make these deluding Writers sensible, that they
must no longe hope with Impunity to abuse the World. For whilst such Men

are quietly permitted to publish Books with promising Titles, and therein to
Assert what they please, and contradict others, and ev’n themselves as they
please, with as little danger of being confuted as of being understood, they
are encourag’d to get themselves a name, at the cost of the Readers, by
finding that intelligent Men are wont for the reason newly mention’d, to let
their Books and Them alone: And the ignorant and credulous (of which the
number is still much greater then that of the other) are forward to admire
most what they least understand. But if Judicious men skill’d in Chymical
affaires shall once agree to write clearly and plainly of them, and thereby
keep men from being stunn’d, as it were, or imposd upon by dark or empty
Words; ’tis to be hop’d that these men finding that they can no longer write
impertinently and absurdly, without being laugh’d at for doing so, will be
reduc’d either to write nothing, or Books that may teach us something, and
not rob men, as formerly, of invaluable Time; and so ceasing to trouble the
World with Riddles or Impertinencies, we shall either by their Books
receive an Advantage, or by their silence escape an Inconvenience.
But after all this is said (continues Eleutherius) it may be represented in
favour of the Chymists, that, in one regard the Liberty they take in using
names, if it be excusable at any time, may be more so when they speak of
the substances whereinto their Analysis resolves mixt Bodies: Since as
Parents have the Right to name their own Children, it has ever been allow’d
to the Authors of new Inventions, to Impose Names upon them. And
therefore the subjects we speak of being so the Productions of the
Chymist’s Art, as not to be otherwise, but by it, obtainable; it seems but
equitable to give the Artists leave to name them as they please: considering
also that none are so fit and likely to teach us what those Bodies are, as they
to whom we ow’d them.
I told You already (sayes Carneades) that there is great Difference betwixt
the being able to make Experiments, and the being able to give a
Philosophical Account of them. And I will not now add, that many a Mine-
digger may meet, whilst he follows his work, with a Gemm or a Mineral
which he knowes not what to make of, till he shews it a Jeweller or a
Mineralist to be inform’d what it is. But that which I would rather have here
observ’d, is, That the Chymists I am now in debate with have given up the
Liberty You challeng’d for them, of using Names at Pleasure, and confin’d
Themselves by their Descriptions, though but such as they are, of their

Principles; so that although they might freely have call’d any thing their
Analysis presents them with, either Sulphur, or Mercury, or Gas, or Blas, or
what they pleas’d; yet when they have told me that Sulphur (for instance) is
a Primogeneal and simple Body, Inflamable, Odorous, &c. they must give
me leave to dis-believe them, if they tell me that a Body that is either
compounded or uninflamable is such a Sulphur; and to think they play with
words, when they teach that Gold and some other Minerals abound with an
Incombustible Sulphur, which is as proper an Expression, as a Sun-shine
Night, or Fluid Ice.
But before I descend to the Mention of Particulars belonging to my Fourth
Consideration, I think it convenient to premise a few Generals; some of
which I shall the less need to insist on at present, because I have Touched
on them already.
And first I must invite you to take notice of a certain passage in
Helmont; Illud notabile, in vino esse Spiritum quendam mitiorem ulterioris & nobilioris
qualitatis participem quā qui immediatè per distillationem elicitur diciturque aqua vitæ
dephlegmata, quod facilius in simplici Olivarum oleo ad oculum spectatur. Quippe distillatum
oleum absque laterum aut tigularum additamento, quodque oleum Philosophorum dicitur, multum
dissert ab ejus oleitate; quæ elicitur prius reducto oleo simplici in partes dissimilares sola
digestione & Salis circulati Paracelsici appositione; siquidem sal circulatum idem in pondere &
quantitatibus pristinis ab oleo segregatur postquam oleum olivarum in sui heterogeneitates est
dispositum. Dulce enim tunc Oleum Olivarum ex oleo, prout & suavissimus vini spiritus a vino
hoc pacto separantur, longéque ab aquæ vitæ acrimoniâ distinctus.—Helmont. Aura vitalis, pag.
725. which though I have not Found much heeded by his Readers, He
Himself mentions as a notable thing, and I take to be a very considerable
one; for whereas the Distill’d oyle of oyle-olive, though drawn per se is (as
I have try’d) of a very sharp and fretting Quality, and of an odious tast, He
tells us that Simple oyle being only digested with Paracelsus’s sal
circulatum, is reduc’d into dissimilar parts, and yields a sweet Oyle, very
differing from the oyle distill’d, from sallet oyle; as also that by the same
way there may be separated from Wine a very sweet and gentle Spirit,
partaking of a far other and nobler quality then that which is immediately
drawn by distillation and call’d Dephlegm’d Aqua vitæ, from whose
Acrimony this other spirit is exceedingly remote, although the sal
circulatum that makes these Anatomies be separated from the Analyz’d
Bodies, in the same weight and with the same qualities it had before; which

Affirmation of Helmont if we admit to be true, we must acknowledge that
there may be a very great disparity betwixt bodies of the same
denomination (as several oyles, or several spirits) separable from compound
Bodies: For, besides the differences I shall anon take notice of, betwixt
those distill’d Oyles that are commonly known to Chymists, it appears by
this, that by means of the Sal Circulatum, There may be quite another sort
of Oyles obtain’d from the same Body; and who knowes but that there may
be yet other Agents found in Nature, by whose help there may, whether by
Transmutation or otherwise, be obtain’d from the Bodies Vulgarly call’d
Mixt, Oyles or other substances, Differing from those of the same
Denomination, known either to Vulgar Chymists, or even to Helmont
Himself: but for fear You should tell me, that this is but a conjecture
grounded upon another Man’s Relation, whose Truth we have not the means
to Experiment, I will not Insist upon it; but leaving You to Consider of it at
leasure, I shall proceed to what is next.
Secondly, Then if that be True which was the Opinion of Lucippus,
Democritus, and other prime Anatomists of old, and is in our dayes reviv’d
by no mean Philosophers; namely, That our Culinary Fire, such as Chymists
use, consists of swarmes of little Bodies swiftly moving, which by their
smallness and motion are able to permeate the sollidest and Compactest
Bodies, and even Glass it Self; If this (I say) be True, since we see that In
flints and other Concretes, the Fiery part is Incorporated with the Grosser, it
will not be Irrationall to conjecture, that multitudes of these Fiery
Corpuscles, getting in at the Pores of the Glass, may associate themselves
with the parts of the mixt Body whereon they work, and with them
Constitute new Kinds of Compound Bodies, according as the Shape, Size,
and other Affections of the Parts of the Dissipated Body happen to dispose
them, in Reference to such Combinations; of which also there may be the
greater Number; if it be likewise granted that the Corpuscles of the Fire,
though all exceeding minute, and very swiftly moved, are not all of the
same bigness, nor Figure. And if I had not Weightier Considerations to
Discourse to you of, I could name to you, to Countenance what I have
newly said, some particular Experiments by which I have been Deduc’d to
think, that the Particles of an open Fire working upon some Bodies may
really Associate themselves therewith, and add to the Quantity. But because
I am not so sure, that when the Fire works upon Bodies included in Glasses,

it does it by a reall Trajection of the Fiery Corpuscles themselves, through
the Substance of the Glass, I will proceed to what is next to be mention’d.
I could (sayes Eleutherius) help you to some Proofes, whereby I think it
may be made very probable, that when the Fire acts immediately upon a
Body, some of its Corpuscles may stick to those of the burnt Body, as they
seem to do in Quicklime, but in greater numbers, and more permanently.
But for fear of retarding Your Progress, I shall desire you to deferr this
Enquiry till another time, and proceed as you intended.
You may then in the next place (sayes Carneades) observe with me, that not
only there are some Bodies, as Gold, and Silver, which do not by the usual
Examens, made by Fire, Discover themselves to be mixt; but if (as You may
Remember I formerly told You) it be a De-compound Body that is
Dissipable into several Substances, by being expos’d to the Fire it may be
resolv’d into such as are neither Elementary, nor such as it was upon its last
mixture Compounded of; but into new Kinds of mixts. Of this I have
already given You some Examples in Sope, Sugar of Lead, and Vitrioll.
Now if we shall Consider that there are some Bodies, as well Natural, (as
that I last nam’d) as Factitious, manifestly De-compounded; That in the
Bowells of the Earth Nature may, as we see she sometimes does, make
strange Mixtures; That Animals are nourish’d with other Animals and
Plants; And, that these themselves have almost all of them their Nutriment
and Growth, either from a certain Nitrous Juice Harbour’d in the Pores of
the Earth, or from the Excrements of Animalls, or from the putrify’d
Bodies, either of living Creatures or Vegetables, or from other Substances
of a Compounded Nature; If, I say, we consider this, it may seem probable,
that there may be among the Works of Nature (not to mention those of Art)
a greater Number of De-compound Bodies, then men take Notice of; And
indeed, as I have formerly also observ’d, it does not at all appear, that all
Mixtures must be of Elementary Bodies; but it seems farr more probable,
that there are divers sorts of compound Bodies, even in regard of all or
some of their Ingredients, consider’d Antecedently to their Mixture. For
though some seem to be made up by the immediate Coalitions of the
Elements, or Principles themselves, and therefore may be call’d Prima
Mista, or Mista Primaria; yet it seems that many other Bodies are mingl’d
(if I may so speak) at the second hand, their immediate Ingredients being
not Elementary, but these primary Mixts newly spoken of; And from divers

of these Secondary sort of Mixts may result, by a further Composition, a
Third sort, and so onwards. Nor is it improbable, that some Bodies are
made up of Mixt Bodies, not all of the same Order, but of several; as (for
Instance) a Concrete may consist of Ingredients, whereof the one may have
been a primary, the other a Secondary Mixt Body; (as I have in Native
Cinnaber, by my way of Resolving it, found both that Courser the part that
seems more properly to be Oar, and a Combustible Sulphur, and a Running
Mercury:) or perhaps without any Ingredient of this latter sort, it may be
compos’d of Mixt Bodies, some of them of the first, and some of the third
Kind; And this may perhaps be somewhat Illustrated by reflecting upon
what happens in some Chymical Preparations of those Medicines which
they call their Bezoardicum’s. For first, they take Antimony and Iron, which
may be look’d upon as Prima Mista; of these they compound a Starry
Regulus, and to this they add according to their Intention, either Gold, or
Silver, which makes with it a new and further Composition. To this they add
Sublimate, which is it self a De-compound body, (consisting of common
Quicksilver, and divers Salts United by Sublimation into a Crystalline
Substance) and from this Sublimate, and the other Metalline Mixtures, they
draw a Liquor, which may be allow’d to be of a yet more Compounded
Nature. If it be true, as Chymists affirm it, that by this Art some of the Gold
or Silver mingl’d with the Regulus may be carry’d over the Helme with it
by the Sublimate; as indeed a Skilfull and Candid person complain’d to me
a while since, That an experienc’d Friend of His and mine, having by such a
way brought over a great Deal of Gold, in hope to do something further
with it, which might be gainfull to him, has not only miss’d of his Aim, but
is unable to recover his Volatiliz’d Gold out of the Antimonial butter,
wherewith it is strictly united.
Now (Continues Carneades) if a Compound body consist of Ingredients
that are not meerly Elementary; it is not hard to conceive, that the
Substances into which the Fire Dissolves it, though seemingly
Homogeneous enough, may be of a Compounded Nature, those parts of
each body that are most of Kin associating themselves into a Compound of
a new Kind. As when (for example sake) I have caus’d Vitrioll and Sal
Armoniack, and Salt Petre to be mingl’d and Destill’d together, the Liquor
that came over manifested it self not to be either Spirit of Nitre, or of Sal
Armoniack, or of Vitrioll. For none of these would dissolve crude gold,

which yet my Liquor was able readily to do; and thereby manifested it self
to be a new Compound, consisting at least of Spirit of Nitre, and Sal
Armoniack, (for the latter dissolv’d in the former, will Work on Gold) which
nevertheless are not by any known way separable, and consequently would
not pass for a Mixt Body, if we our selves did not, to obtain it, put and
Distill together divers Concretes, whose Distinct Operations were known
before hand. And, to add on this Occasion the Experiment I lately promis’d
You, because it is Applicable to our present purpose, I shall Acquaint You,
that suspecting the Common Oyle of Vitrioll not to be altogether such a
simple Liquor as Chymists presume it, I mingl’d it with an equal or a
Double Quantity (for I try’d the Experiment more then once) of common
Oyle of Turpentine, such as together with the other Liquor I bought at the
Drugsters. And having carefully (for the Experiment is Nice, and somewhat
dangerous) Distill’d the Mixture in a small Glass Retort, I obtain’d
according to my Desire, (besides the two Liquors I had put in) a pretty
Quantity of a certain substance, which sticking all about the Neck of the
Retort Discover’d it self to be Sulphur, not only by a very strong
Sulphureous smell, and by the colour of Brimstone; but also by this, That
being put upon a coal, it was immediately kindl’d, and burn’d like common
Sulphur. And of this Substance I have yet by me some little Parcells, which
You may command and examine when you please. So that from this
Experiment I may deduce either one, or both of these Propositions, That a
real Sulphur may be made by the Conjunction of two such Substances as
Chymists take for Elementary, And which did not either of them apart
appear to have any such body in it; or that Oyle of Vitrioll though a Distill’d
Liquor, and taken for part of the Saline Principle of the Concrete that yields
it, may yet be so Compounded a body as to contain, besides its Saline part,
a Sulphur like common brimstone, which would hardly be it self a simple or
un-compounded body.
I might (pursues Carneades) remind You, that I formerly represented it, as
possible, That as there may be more Elements then five, or six; so the
Elements of one body may be Different from those of another; whence it
would follow, that from the Resolution of De-compound body, there may
result Mixts of an altogether new kind, by the Coalition of Elements that
never perhaps conven’d before. I might, I say, mind You of this, and add
divers things to this second Consideration; but for fear of wanting time I

willingly pretermit them, to pass on to the third, which is this, That the Fire
does not alwayes barely resolve or take asunder, but may also after a new
manner mingle and compound together the parts (whether Elementary or
not) of the Body Dissipated by it.
This is so evident, sayes Carneades, in some obvious Examples, that I
cannot but wonder at their Supiness that have not taken notice of it. For
when Wood being burnt in a Chimney is dissipated by the Fire into Smoke
and Ashes, that smoke composes soot, which is so far from being any one
of the principles of the Wood, that (as I noted above) you may by a further
Analysis separate five or six distinct substances from it. And as for the
remaining Ashes, the Chymists themselves teach us, that by a further degree
of fire they may be indissolubly united into glass. ’Tis true, that the
Analysis which the Chymists principally build upon is made, not in the open
air, but in close Vessels; but however, the Examples lately produc’d may
invite you shrewdly to suspect, That heat may as well compound as
dissipate the Parts of mixt Bodies: and not to tell you, that I have known a
Vitrification made even in close vessels, I must remind you that the Flowers
of Antimony, and those of Sulphur, are very mix’d Bodies, though they
ascend in close vessells: And that ’twas in stopt glasses that I brought up the
whole Body of Camphire. And whereas it may be objected, that all these
Examples are of Bodies forc’d up in a dry, not a Fluid forme, as are the
Liquors wont to be obtain’d by distillation; I answer, That besides that ’tis
possible, that a Body may be chang’d from Consistent to Fluid, or from
Fluid to Consistent, without being otherwise much altered, as may appear
by the Easiness wherewith in Winter, without any Addition or Separation of
Visible Ingredients, the same substance may be quickly harden’d into brittle
Ice, and thaw’d again into Fluid Water; Besides this, I say it would be
consider’d, that common Quick-silver it self, which the Eminentest
Chymists confess to be a mixt Body, may be Driven over the Helme in its
Pristine forme of Quicksilver, and consequently, in that of a Liquor. And
certainly ’tis possible that very compounded Bodies may concur to
Constitute Liquors; Since, not to mention that I have found it possible, by
the help of a certain Menstruum, to distill Gold it self through a Retort, even
with a Moderate Fire: Let us but consider what happens in Butter of
Antimony. For if that be carefully rectify’d, it may be reduc’d into a very
clear Liquor; and yet if You cast a quantity of fair water upon it, there will

quickly precipitate a Ponderous and Vomitive Calx, which made before a
considerable part of the Liquor, and yet is indeed (though some eminent
Chymists would have it Mercurial) an Antimonial Body carryed over and
kept dissolv’d by the Salts of the Sublimate, and consequently a
compounded one; as You may find if You will have the Curiosity to
Examine this White powder by a skilful Reduction. And that You may not
think that Bodies as compounded as flowers of Brimstone cannot be
brought to Concurr to Constitute Distill’d Liquors; And also That You may
not imagine with Divers Learned Men that pretend no small skill in
Chymistry, that at least no mixt Body can be brought over the Helme, but
by corrosive Salts, I am ready to shew You, when You please, among other
wayes of bringing over Flowers of Brimstone (perhaps I might add even
Mineral Sulphurs) some, wherein I employ none but Oleaginous bodies to
make Volatile Liquors, in which not only the colour, but (which is a much
surer mark) the smell and some Operations manifest that there is brought
over a Sulphur that makes part of the Liquor.
One thing more there is, Eleutherius, sayes Carneades, which is so
pertinent to my present purpose, that though I have touch’d upon it before, I
cannot but on this occasion take notice of it. And it is this, That the
Qualities or Accidents, upon whose account Chymists are wont to call a
portion of Matter by the name of Mercury or some other of their Principles,
are not such but that ’tis possible as Great (and therefore why not the like?)
may be produc’d by such changes of Texture, and other Alterations, as the
Fire may make in the small Parts of a Body. I have already prov’d, when I
discours’d of the second General Consideration, by what happens to plants
nourish’d only with fair water, and Eggs hatch’d into Chickens, that by
changing the disposition of the component parts of a Body, Nature is able to
effect as great Changes in a parcell of Matter reputed similar, as those
requisite to Denominate one of the Tria Prima. And though Helmont do
somewhere wittily call the Fire the Destructor and the Artificial Death of
Things; And although another Eminent Chymist and Physitian be pleas’d to
build upon this, That Fire can never generate any thing but Fire; Yet You
will, I doubt not, be of another mind, If You consider how many new sorts
of mixt Bodies Chymists themselves have produc’d by means of the Fire:
And particularly, if You consider how that Noble and Permanent Body,
Glass, is not only manifestly produc’d by the violent action of the Fire, but

has never, for ought we know, been produc’d any other way. And indeed it
seems but an inconsiderate Assertion of some Helmontians, that every sort
of Body of a Peculiar Denomination must be produc’d by some Seminal
power; as I think I could evince, if I thought it so necessary, as it is for me
to hasten to what I have further to discourse. Nor need it much move us,
that there are some who look upon whatsoever the Fire is employ’d to
produce, not as upon Natural but Artificial Bodies. For there is not alwaies
such a difference as many imagine betwixt the one and the other: Nor is it
so easy as they think, clearly to assigne that which Properly, Constantly, and
Sufficiently, Discriminates them. But not to engage my self in so nice a
Disquisition, it may now suffice to observe, that a thing is commonly
termed Artificial, when a parcel of matter is by the Artificers hand, or Tools,
or both, brought to such a shape or Form, as he Design’d before-hand in his
Mind: Whereas in many of the Chymical Productions the effect would be
produc’d whether the Artificer intended it or no; and is oftentimes very
much other then he Intended or Look’t for; and the Instruments employ’d,
are not Tools Artificially fashion’d and shaped, like those of Tradesmen, for
this or that particular Work; but, for the most part, Agents of Nature’s own
providing, and whose chief Powers of Operation they receive from their
own Nature or Texture, not the Artificer. And indeed, the Fire is as well a
Natural Agent as Seed: And the Chymist that imployes it, does but apply
Natural Agents and Patients, who being thus brought together, and acting
according to their respective Natures, performe the worke themselves; as
Apples, Plums, or other fruit, are natural Productions, though the Gardiner
bring and fasten together the Sciens of the Stock, and both Water, and do
perhaps divers other wayes Contribute to its bearing fruit. But, to proceed to
what I was going to say, You may observe with me, Eleutherius, that, as I
told You once before, Qualities sleight enough may serve to Denominate a
Chymical Principle. For, when they anatomize a compound Body by the
Fire, if they get a Substance inflamable, and that will not mingle with
Water, that they presently call Sulphur; what is sapid and Dissoluble in
Water, that must pass for Salt; Whatsoever is fix’d and indissoluble in
Water, that they name Earth. And I was going to add, that, whatsoever
Volatile substance they know not what to make of, not to say, whatsoever
they please, that they call Mercury. But that these Qualities may either be
produc’d, otherwise then by such as they call Seminal Agents, or may
belong to bodies of a compounded Nature, may be shewn, among other

Instances, in Glass made of ashes, where the exceeding strongly-tasted
Alcalizate Salt joyning with the Earth becomes insipid, and with it
constitutes a Body, which though also dry, fixt, and indissoluble in Water, is
yet manifestly a mixt Body; and made so by the Fire itself.
And I remmember to our present purpose, that Helmont, Helmont pag. 412.
amongst other Medicines that he commends, has a short processe, wherein,
though the Directions for Practice are but obscurely intimated; yet I have
some reason not to Dis-believe the Process, without affirming or denying
any thing about the vertues of the remedy to be made by it. Quando (sayes
he) oleum cinnamomi &c. suo sali alkali miscetur absque omni aqua, trium
mensium artificiosa occultaque circulatione, totum in salem volatilem
commutatum est, vere essentiam sui simplicis in nobis exprimit, & usque in
prima nostri constitutivasese ingerit. A not unlike Processe he delivers in
another place; from whence, if we suppose him to say true, I may argue,
that since by the Fire there may be produc’d a substance that is as well
Saline and volatile as the Salt of Harts-horn, blood, &c. which pass for
Elementary; and since that this Volatile Salt is really compounded of a
Chymical Oyle and a fixt Salt, the one made Volatile by the other, and both
associated by the fire, it may well be suspected that other Substances,
emerging upon the Dissipation of Bodies by the Fire, may be new sorts of
Mixts, and consist of Substances of differing natures; and particularly, I
have sometimes suspected, that since the Volatile Salts of Blood, Harts-
horn, &c. are figitive and endow’d with an exceeding strong smell, either
that Chymists do Erroneously ascribe all odours to sulphurs, or that such
Salts consist of some oyly parts well incorporated with the Saline ones. And
the like conjecture I have also made concerning Spirit of Vinager, which,
though the Chymists think one of the Principles of that Body, and though
being an Acid Spirit it seems to be much less of kin then Volatile Salts to
sulphurs; yet, not to mention its piercing smell; which I know not with what
congruity the Chymist will deduce from Salt, I wonder they have not taken
notice of what their own Tyrocinium Chymicum Tyroc. Chym.
L. 1. C. 4. teach us concerning the Destillation of Saccharum Saturni; out of
which Beguinus assures Us, that he distill’d, besides a very fine spirit, no
lesse then two Oyles, the one blood-red and ponderous, but the other
swimming upon the top of the Spirit, and of a yellow colour; of which he
sayes that he kept then some by him, to verify what he delivers. And though

I remember not that I have had two distinct Oyles from Sugar of Lead, yet
that it will though distill’d without addition yield some Oyle, disagrees not
with my Experience. I know the Chymists will be apt to pretend, that these
Oyls are but the volatiliz’d sulphur of the lead; and will perhaps argue it
from what Beguinus relates, that when the Distillation is ended, you’l find a
Caput Mortuum extreamly black, and (as he speaks) nullius momenti, as if
the Body, or at least the chief part of the Metal it self were by the
distillation carried over the Helme. But since you know as well as I that
Saccharum Saturni is a kind of Magistery, made only by calcining of Lead
per se, dissolving it in distill’d Vinager, and crystalizing the solution; if I
had leasure to tell You how Differing a thing I did upon examination find
the Caput Mortuum, so sleighted by Beguinus, to be from what he
represents it, I believe you would think the conjecture propos’d less
probable then one or other of these three; either that this Oyle did formerly
concur to constitute the Spirit of Vinager, and so that what passes for a
Chymical Principle may yet be further resoluble into distinct substances; or
that some parts of the Spirit together with some parts of the Lead may
constitute a Chymical Oyle, which therefore though it pass for
Homogeneous, may be a very compounded Body: or at least that by the
action of the Distill’d Vinager and the Saturnine Calx one upon another,
part of the Liquor may be so alter’d as to be transmuted from an Acid Spirit
into an Oyle. And though the truth of either of the two former conjectures
would make the example I have reflected on more pertinent to my present
argument; yet you’l easily discern, the Third and last Conjecture cannot be
unserviceable to confirm some other passages of my discourse.
To return then to what I was saying just before I mention’d Helmont’s
Experiment, I shall subjoyne, That Chymists must confess also that in the
perfectly Dephlegm’d spirit of Wine, or other Fermented Liquors, that
which they call the Sulphur of the Concrete loses, by the Fermentation, the
Property of Oyle, (which the Chymists likewise take to be the true Sulphur
of the Mixt) of being unminglable with the Water. And if You will credit
Helmont, Ostendi alias, quomodo lib. una aquæ vitæ combibita in sale Tartari siccato, vix fiat
semuncia salis, cæterum totum corpus fiat aqua Elementalis. Helmont. in Aura vitali. all of the
purest Spirit of Wine may barely by the help of pure Salt of Tartar (which is
but the fixed Salt of Wine) be resolv’d or Transmuted into scarce half an
ounce of Salt, and as much Elementary Water as amounts to the remaining

part of the mention’d weight. And it may (as I think I formerly also noted)
be doubted, whether that Fixt and Alcalizate Salt, which is so unanimously
agreed on to be the Saline Principle of incinerated Bodies, be not, as ’tis
Alcalizate, a Production of the Fire? For though the tast of Tartar, for
Example, seem to argue that it contains a Salt before it be burn’d, yet that
Salt being very Acid is of a quite Differing Tast from the Lixiviate Salt of
Calcin’d Tartar. And though it be not truly Objected against the Chymists,
that they obtain all Salts they make, by reducing the Body they work on into
Ashes with Violent Fires, (since Hartshorn, Amber, Blood, and divers other
Mixts yield a copious Salt before they be burn’d to Ashes) yet this Volatile
Salt Differs much, as we shall see anon, from the Fixt Alcalizate Salt I
speak of; which for ought I remember is not producible by any known Way,
without Incineration. ’Tis not unknown to Chymists, that Quicksilver may
be Precipitated, without Addition, into a dry Powder, that remains so in
Water. And some eminent Spagyrists, and even Raimund Lully himself,
teach, that meerly by the Fire Quicksilver may in convenient Vessels be
reduc’d (at least in great part) into a thin Liquor like Water, and minglable
with it. So that by the bare Action of the Fire, ’tis possible, that the parts of
a mixt Body should be so dispos’d after new and differing manners, that it
may be sometimes of one consistence, sometimes of another; And may in
one State be dispos’d to be mingl’d with Water, and in another not. I could
also shew you, that Bodies from which apart Chymists cannot obtain any
thing that is Combustible, may by being associated together, and by the help
of the Fire, afford an inflamable Substance. And that on the other side, ’tis
possible for a Body to be inflamable, from which it would very much
puzzle any ordinary Chymist; and perhaps any other, to separate an
inflamable Principle or Ingredient. Wherefore, since the Principles of
Chymists may receive their Denominations from Qualities, which it often
exceeds not the power of Art, nor alwayes that of the Fire to produce; And
since such Qualities may be found in Bodies that differ so much in other
Qualities from one another, that they need not be allow’d to agree in that
pure and simple Nature, which Principles, to be so indeed, must have; it
may justly be suspected, that many Productions of the Fire that are shew’d
us by Chymists, as the Principles of the Concrete that afforded them, may
be but a new kind of Mixts. And to annex, on this Occasion, to these
arguments taken from the Nature of the thing, one of those which Logicians
call ad Hominem, I shall desire You to take Notice, that though Paracelsus

Himself, and some that are so mistaken as to think he could not be so, have
ventur’d to teach, that not only the bodies here below, but the Elements
themselves, and all the other Parts of the Universe, are compos’d of Salt,
Sulphur and Mercury; yet the learned Sennertus, and all the more wary
Chymists, have rejected that conceit, and do many of them confess, that the
Tria Prima are each of them made up of the four Elements; and others of
them make Earth and Water concur with Salt, Sulphur and Mercury, to the
Constitution of Mixt bodies. So that one sort of these Spagyrists,
notwithstanding the specious Titles they give to the productions of the Fire,
do in effect grant what I contend for. And, of the other sort I may well
demand, to what Kind of Bodies the Phlegme and dead Earth, to be met
with in Chymical Resolutions, are to be referr’d? For either they must say,
with Paracelsus, but against their own Concessions as well as against
Experience, that these are also compos’d of the Tria Prima, whereof they
cannot separate any one from either of them; or else they must confess that
two of the vastest Bodies here below, Earth, and Water, are neither of them
compos’d of the Tria Prima; and that consequently those three are not the
Universal, and Adequate Ingredients, neither of all Sublunary Bodies, nor
even of all mixt Bodies.
I know that the chief of these Chymists represent, that though the Distinct
Substances into which they divide mixt bodies by the Fire, are not pure and
Homogeneous; yet since the four Elements into which the Aristotelians
pretend to resolve the like bodies by the same Agent, are not simple neither,
as themselves acknowledge, ’tis as allowable for the Chymists to call the
one Principles, as for the Peripateticks to call the other Elements; since in
both cases the Imposition of the name is grounded only upon the
Predominancy of that Element whose name is ascrib’d to it. Nor shall I
deny, that this Argument of the Chymists is no ill one against the
Aristotelians. But what Answer can it prove to me, who you know am
disputing against the Aristotelian Elements, as the Chymicall Principles,
and must not look upon any body as a true Principle or Element, but as yet
compounded, which is not perfectly Homogeneous, but is further Resoluble
into any number of Distinct Substances how small soever. And as for the
Chymists calling a body Salt, or Sulphur, or Mercury, upon pretence that the
Principle of the same name is predominant in it, That it self is an
Acknowledgment of what I contend for; namely that these productions of

the Fire, are yet compounded bodies. And yet whilst this is granted, it is
affirm’d, but not prov’d, that the reputed Salt, or Sulphur, or Mercury,
consists mainly of one body that deserves the name of a principle of the
same Denomination. For how do Chymists make it appear that there are any
such primitive and simple bodies in those we are speaking of; since ’tis
upon the matter confess’d by the answer lately made, that these are not
such? And if they pretend by Reason to evince what they affirm, what
becomes of their confident boasts, that the Chymists (whom they therefore,
after Beguinus, call a Philosophus or Opifex Sensatus) can convince our
Eyes, by manifestly shewing in any mixt body those simple substances he
teaches them to be compos’d of? And indeed, for the Chymists to have
recourse in this case to other proofs then Experiments, as it is to wave the
grand Argument that has all this while been given out for a Demonstrative
One; so it releases me from the obligation to prosecute a Dispute wherein I
am not engag’d to Examine any but Experimentall proofs. I know it may
plausibly Enough be Represented, in favour of the Chymists, that it being
evident that much the greater part of any thing they call Salt, or Sulphur, or
Mercury, is really such; it would be very rigid to deny those Substances the
names ascribed them, only because of some sleight mixture of another
Body; since not only the Peripateticks call particular parcels of matter
Elementary, though they acknowledge that Elements are not to be anywhere
found pure, at least here below; And since especially there is a manifest
Analogie and Resemblance betwixt the bodies obtainable by Chymical
Anatomies and the principles whose names are given them; I have, I say,
consider’d that these things may be represented: But as for what is drawn
from the Custome of the Peripateticks, I have already told You, that though
it may be employ’d against Them, Yet it is not available against me who
allow nothing to be an Element that is not perfectly Homogeneous. And
whereas it is alledg’d, that the Predominant Principle ought to give a name
to the substance wherein it abounds; I answer, that that might much more
reasonably be said, if either we or the Chymists had seen Nature take pure
Salt, pure Sulphur, and pure Mercury, and compound of them every sort of
Mixt Bodies. But, since ’tis to experience that they appeal, we must not take
it for granted, that the Distill’d Oyle (for instance) of a plant is mainly
compos’d of the pure principle call’d Sulphur, till they have given us an
ocular proof, that there is in that sort of Plants such an Homogeneous
Sulphur. For as for the specious argument, which is drawn from the

Resemblance betwixt the Productions of the Fire, and the Respective, either
Aristotelian Elements, or Chymical Principles, by whose names they are
call’d; it will appear more plausible then cogent, if You will but recall to
mind the state of the controversie; which is not, whether or no there be
obtain’d from mixt Bodies certain substances that agree in outward
appearance, or in some Qualities with Quicksilver or Brimstone, or some
such obvious or copious Body; But whether or no all Bodies confess’d to be
perfectly mixt were compos’d of, and are resoluble into a determinate
number of primary unmixt Bodies. For, if you keep the state of the question
in your Eye, you’l easily discerne that there is much of what should be
Demonstrated, left unprov’d by those Chymical Experiments we are
Examining. But (not to repeat what I have already discover’d more at large)
I shall now take notice, that it will not presently follow, that because a
Production of the Fire has some affinity with some of the greater Masses of
matter here below, that therefore they are both of the same Nature, and
deserve the same Name; for the Chymists are not content, that flame should
be look’t upon as a parcel of the Element of Fire, though it be hot, dry, and
active, because it wants some other Qualities belonging to the nature of
Elementary fire. Nor will they let the Peripateticks call Ashes, or
Quicklime, Earth, notwithstanding the many likenesses between them;
because they are not tastlesse, as Elementary Earth ought to be: But if you
should ask me, what then it is, that all the Chymical Anatomies of Bodies
do prove, if they prove not that they consist of the three Principles into
which the fire resolves them? I answer, that their Dissections may be
granted to prove, that some mixt bodies (for in many it will not hold) are by
the fire, when they are included in close Vessels, (for that Condition also is
often requisite) dissolube into several Substances differing in some
Qualities, but principally in Consistence. So that out of most of them may
be obtain’d a fixt substance partly saline, and partly insipid, an unctuous
Liquor, and another Liquor or more that without being unctuous have a
manifest taste. Now if Chymists will agree to call the dry and sapid
substance salt, the Unctous liquor Sulphur, and the other Mercury, I shall
not much quarrel with them for so doing: But if they will tell me that Salt,
Sulphur, and Mercury, are simple and primary bodies whereof each mixt
body was actually compounded, and which was really in it antecedently to
the operation of the fire, they must give me leave to doubt whether
(whatever their other arguments may do) their Experiments prove all this.

And if they will also tell me that the Substances their Anatomies are wont to
afford them, are pure and similar, as Principles ought to be, they must give
me leave to believe my own senses; and their own confessions, before their
bare Assertions. And that you may not (Eleutherius) think I deal so rigidly
with them, because I scruple to Take these Productions of the Fire for such
as the Chymists would have them pass for, upon the account of their having
some affinity with them; consider a little with me, that in regard an Element
or Principle ought to be perfectly Similar and Homogeneous, there is no just
cause why I should rather give the body propos’d the Name of this or that
Element or Principle, because it has a resemblance to it in some obvious
Quality, rather then deny it that name upon the account of divers other
Qualities, wherein the propos’d Bodies are unlike; and if you do but
consider what sleight and easily producible qualities they are that suffice, as
I have already more then once observ’d, to Denominate a Chymical
Principle or an Element, you’l not, I hope, think my wariness to be destitute
either of Example, or else of Reason. For we see that the Chymists will not
allow the Aristotelians that the Salt in Ashes ought to be called Earth,
though the Saline and Terrestrial part symbolize in weight, in dryness, in
fixness and fusibility, only because the one is sapid and dissoluble in Water,
and the other not: Besides, we see that sapidness and volatility are wont to
denominate the Chymists Mercury or Spirit; and yet how many Bodies,
think you, may agree in those Qualities which may yet be of very differing
natures, and disagree in qualities either more numerous, or more
considerable, or both. For not only Spirit of Nitre, Aqua Fortis, Spirit of
Salt, Spirit of Oyle of Vitriol, Spirit of Allome, Spirit of Vinager, and all
Saline Liquors Distill’d from Animal Bodies, but all the Acetous Spirits of
Woods freed from their Vinager; All these, I say, and many others must
belong to the Chymists Mercury, though it appear not why some of them
should more be comprehended under one denomination then the Chymists
Sulphur, or Oyle should likewise be; for their Distill’d Oyles are also Fluid,
Volatile, and Tastable, as well as their Mercury; Nor is it Necessary, that
their Sulphur should be Unctuous or Dissoluble in Water, since they
generally referr Spirit of Wine to Sulphurs, although that Spirit be not
Unctuous, and will freely mingle with Water. So that bare Inflamability
must constitute the Essence of the Chymists Sulphur; as uninflamablenesse
joyned with any taste is enough to intitle a Distill’d Liquor to be their
Mercury. Now since I can further observe to You, that Spirit of Nitre and

Spirit of Harts-horne being pour’d together will boile and hisse and tosse up
one another into the air, which the Chymists make signes of great Antipathy
in the Natures of Bodies (as indeed these Spirits differ much both in Taste,
Smell, and Operations;) Since I elsewhere tell you of my having made two
sorts of Oyle out of the same mans blood, that would not mingle with one
another; And since I might tell You Divers Examples I have met with, of the
Contrariety of Bodies which according to the Chymists must be huddl’d up
together under one Denomination; I leave you to Judge whether such a
multitude of Substances as may agree in these sleight Qualities, and yet
Disagree in Others more Considerable, are more worthy to be call’d by the
Name of a Principle (which ought to be pure and homogeneous,) than to
have appellations given them that may make them differ, in name too, from
the bodies from which they so wildly differ in Nature. And hence also, by
the bye, you may perceive that ’tis not unreasonable to distrust the
Chymists way of Argumentation, when being unable to shew us that such a
Liquor is (for Example) purely saline, they prove, that at least salt is much
the predominant principle, because that the propos’d substance is strongly
tasted, and all Tast proceeds from salt; whereas those Spirits, such as spirit
of Tartar, spirit of Harts-horn, and the like, which are reckoned to be the
Mercuries of the Bodies that afford them, have manifestly a strong and
piercing tast, and so has (according to what I formerly noted) the spirit of
Box &c. even after the acid Liquor that concurr’d to compose it has been
separated from it. And indeed, if sapidness belong not to the spirit or
Mercurial Principle of Vegitables and Animals: I scarce know how it will be
discriminated from their phlegm, since by the absence of Inflamability it
must be distinguish’d from their sulphur, which affords me another
Example, to prove how unacurate the Chymical Doctrine is in our present
Case; since not only the spirits of Vegitables and Animals, but their Oyles
are very strongly tasted, as he that shall but wet his tongue with Chymical
Oyle of Cinnamon, or of Cloves, or even of Turpentine, may quickly find,
to his smart. And not only I never try’d any Chymical Oyles whose tast was
not very manifest and strong; but a skilful and inquisitive person who made
it his business by elaborate operations to depurate Chymical Oyles, and
reduce them to an Elementary simplicity, Informes us, that he never was
able to make them at all Tastless; whence I might inferr, that the proof
Chymists confidently give us of a bodies being saline, is so far from
demonstrating the Predominancy, that it does not clearly Evince so much as

the presence of the saline Principle in it. But I will not (pursues Carneades)
remind you, that the Volatile salt of Harts-horn, Amber, Blood, &c. are
exceeding strongly scented, notwithstanding that most Chymists deduce
Odours from Sulphur, and from them argue the Predominancy of that
Principle in the Odorous body, because I must not so much as add any new
Examples of the incompetency of this sort of Chymical arguments; since
having already detain’d You but too long in those generals that appertain to
my fourth consideration, ’tis time that I proceed to the particulars
themselves, to which I thought fit they should be previous:
These Generals (continues Carneades) being thus premis’d, we might the
better survey the Unlikeness that an attentive and unprepossess’d observer
may take notice of in each sort of Bodies which the Chymists are wont to
call the salts or sulphurs or Mercuries of the Concretes that yield Them, as
if they had all a simplicity, and Identity of Nature: whereas salts if they
were all Elementary would as little differ as do the Drops of pure and
simple Water. ’Tis known that both Chymists and Physitians ascribe to the
fixt salts of calcin’d Bodies the vertues of their concretes; and consequently
very differing Operations. So we find the Alkali of Wormwood much
commended in distempers of the stomach; that of Eyebright for those that
have a weak sight; and that of Guaiacum (of which a great Quantity yields
but a very little salt) is not only much commended in Venereal Diseases, but
is believed to have a peculiar purgative vertue, which yet I have not had
occasion to try. And though, I confess, I have long thought, that these
Alkalizate salts are, for the most part, very neer of kin, and retain very little
of the properties of the Concretes whence they were separated; Yet being
minded to Observe watchfully whether I could meet with any Exceptions to
this General Observation, I observ’d at the Glasse-house, that sometimes
the Metal (as the Workmen call it) or Masse of colliquated Ingredients,
which by Blowing they fashion into Vessels of divers shapes, did sometimes
prove of a very differing colour, and a somewhat differing Texture, from
what was usuall. And having enquired whether the cause of such Accidents
might not be derived from the peculiar Nature of the fixt salt employ’d to
bring the sand to fusion, I found that the knowingst Workmen imputed these
Mis-adventures to the Ashes, of some certain kind of Wood, as having
observ’d the ignobler kind of Glass I lately mention’d to be frequently
produc’d when they had employ’d such sorts of Ashes which therefore they

scruple to make use of, if they took notice of them beforehand. I remember
also, that an Industrious Man of my acquaintance having bought a vast
quantity of Tobacco stalks to make a fixt Salt with, I had the Curiosity to go
see whether that Exotick Plant, which so much abounds in volatile salt,
would afford a peculiar kind of Alcali; and I was pleas’d to find that in the
Lixivium of it, it was not necessary, as is usual, to evaporate all the Liquor,
that there might be obtain’d a Saline Calx, consisting like lime quench’d in
the Air of a heap of little Corpuscles of unregarded shapes; but the fixt salt
shot into figur’d Crystal, almost as Nitre or Sal-armoniack and other
uncalcin’d salts are wont to do; And I further remember that I have observ’d
in the fixt Salt of Urine, brought by depuration to be very white, a tast not
so unlike to that of common salt, and very differing from the wonted
caustick Lixiviate tast of other salts made by Incineration. But because the
Instances I have alledg’d of the Difference of Alcalizate salt are but few,
and therefore I am still inclin’d to think, that most Chymists and many
Physitians do, inconsideratly enough and without Warrant from Experience,
ascribe the Vertues of the Concretes expos’d to Calcination, to the salts
obtain’d by it; I shall rather, to shew the Disparity of salts, mention in the
first Place the apparent Difference betwixt the Vegetable fixt salts and the
Animal Volatile ones: As (for Example) betwixt salt of Tartar, and salt of
Harts-horn; whereof the former is so fixt that ’twill indure the brunt of a
violent Fire, and stand in fusion like a Metal; whereas the other (besides
that it has a differing tast and a very differing smell) is so far from being
fixt, that it will fly away in a gentle heat as easily as Spirit of Wine it self.
And to this I shall add, in the next place, That even among the Volatile salts
themselves, there is a considerable Difference, as appears by the distinct
Properties of (for Instance) salt of Amber, salt of Urine, salt of Mans Skull,
(so much extoll’d against the falling Sicknesse) and divers others which
cannot escape an ordinary Observer. And this Diversity of Volatile salts I
have observ’d to be somtimes Discernable even to the Eye, in their Figures.
For the salt of Harts-horn I have observ’d to adhere to the Receiver in the
forme almost of a Parallelipipedon; and of the Volatile salt of humane
blood (long digested before distillation, with spirit of Wine) I can shew you
store of graines of that Figure which Geometricians call a Rhombus; though
I dare not undertake that the Figures of these or other Saline Crystals (if I
may so call Them) will be alwaies the same, whatever degree of Fire have
been employ’d to force them up, or how hastily soever they have been

made to convene in the spirits or liquors, in the lower part of which I have
usually observ’d them after a while to shoot. And although, as I lately told
You, I seldom found any Difference, as to Medical Vertues, in the fixt Salts
of Divers Vegetables; and accordingly I have suspected that most of these
volatile Salts, having so great a Resemblance in smell, in tast, and
fugitiveness, differ but little, if at all, in their Medicinal properties: As
indeed I have found them generally to agree in divers of them (as in their
being somewhat Diaphoretick and very Deopilative; Yet I remember
Helmont Error vero per distillationem nobis monstrat etiam Spiritum salinum plane volatilem
odore nequicquam ut nec gustu distinguibilem a spiritu Urinæ; In eo tamen essentialiter
diversum, quod spiritus talis cruoris curat Epilepsiam, non autem Spiritus salis lotii. Helmont.
Aura Vitalis. somewhere informes us, that there is this Difference betwixt the
saline spirit of Urine and that of Mans blood, that the former will not cure
the Epilepsy, but the Latter will. Of the Efficacy also of the Salt of Common
Amber against the same Disease in Children, (for in Grown Persons it is not
a specifick) I may elsewhere have an Occasion to Entertain You. And when
I consider that to the obtaining of these Volatile Salts (especially that of
Urine) there is not requisite such a Destructive Violence of the Fire, as there
is to get those Salts that must be made by Incineration, I am the more
invited to conclude, that they may differ from one another, and
consequently recede from an Elementary Simplicity. And, if I could here
shew You what Mr. Boyle has Observ’d, touching the Various Chymicall
Distinctions of Salts; You would quickly discern, not only that Chymists do
give themselves a strange Liberty to call Concretes Salts, that are according
to their own Rules to be look’d upon as very Compounded Bodies; but that
among those very Salts that seem Elementary, because produc’d upon the
Anatomy of the Bodies that yield them, there is not only a visible Disparity,
but, to speak in the common Language, a manifest Antipathy or Contrariety:
As is evident in the Ebullition and hissing that is wont to ensue, when the
Acid Spirit of Vitrioll, for Instance, is pour’d upon pot ashes, or Salt of
Tartar. And I shall beg leave of this Gentleman, sayes Carneades, casting
his Eyes on me, to let me observe to You out of some of his papers,
particularly those wherein he treats of some Preparations of Urine, that not
only one and the same body may have two Salts of a contrary Nature, as he
exemplifies in the Spirit and Alkali of Nitre; but that from the same body
there may without addition be obtain’d three differing and Visible Salts. For
He Relates, that he observ’d in Urine, not only a Volatile and Crystalline

Salt, and a fixt Salt, but likewise a kind of Sal Armoniack, or such a Salt as
would sublime in the form of a salt, and therefore was not fixt, and yet was
far from being so fugitive as the Volatile salt; from which it seem’d also
otherwise to differ. I have indeed suspected that this may be a Sal
Armoniack properly enough so call’d, as Compounded of the Volatile salt of
Urine, and the fixt of the same Liquor, which, as I noted, is not unlike sea-
salt; but that it self argues a manifest Difference betwixt the salts, since
such a Volatile salt is not wont to Unite thus with an ordinary Alcali, but to
fly away from it in the Heat. And on this occasion I remember that, to give
some of my Friends an Ocular proof of the difference betwixt the fixt and
Volatile salt (of the same Concrete) Wood, I devis’d the following
Experiment. I took common Venetian sublimate, and dissolv’d as much of it
as I well could in fair Water: then I took Wood Ashes, and pouring on them
Warme Water, Dissolv’d their salt; and filtrating the Water, as soon as I
found the Lixivium sufficiently sharp upon the tongue, I reserv’d it for use:
Then on part of the former solution of sublimate dropping a little of this
Dissolv’d Fixt salt of Wood, the Liquors presently turn’d of an Orange
Colour; but upon the other part of the clear solution of sublimate putting
some of the Volatile salt of Wood (which abounds in the spirit of soot) the
Liquor immediately turn’d white, almost like Milke, and after a while let
fall a white sediment, as the other Liquor did a Yellow one. To all this that I
have said concerning the Difference of salts, I might add what I Formerly
told you, concerning the simple spirit of Box, and such like Woods, which
differ much from the other salts hitherto mention’d, and yet would belong
to the saline Principle, if Chymists did truly teach that all Tasts proceed
from it. And I might also annex, what I noted to you out of
Helmont Aliquando oleum Cinnamomi, &c. suo sali Alcali miscetur absque omni aqua, trium
mensium Artificiosa occultaque circulatione, totum in salem volatilem commutatum est. Helmont.
Tria Prima Chymicorum, &c. pag. 412. concerning Bodies, which, though they
consist in great part of Chymical Oyles, do yet appear but Volatile salts; But
to insist on these things, were to repeat; and therefore I shall proceed.
This Disparity is also highly eminent in the separated sulphurs or Chymical
Oyles of things. For they contain so much of the scent, and tast, and
vertues, of the Bodies whence they were drawn, that they seem to be but the
Material Crasis (if I may so speak) of their Concretes. Thus the Oyles of
Cinnamon, Cloves, Nutmegs and other spices, seem to be but the United

Aromatick parts that did ennoble those Bodies. And ’tis a known thing, that
Oyl of Cinnamon, and oyle of Cloves, (which I have likewise observ’d in
the Oyles of several Woods) will sink to the Bottom of Water: whereas
those of Nutmegs and divers other Vegetables will swim upon it. The Oyle
(abusively call’d spirit) of Roses swims at the Top of the Water in the forme
of a white butter, which I remember not to have observ’d in any other Oyle
drawn in any Limbeck; yet there is a way (not here to be declar’d) by which
I have seen it come over in the forme of other Aromatick Oyles, to the
Delight and Wonder of those that beheld it. In Oyle of Anniseeds, which I
drew both with, and without Fermentation, I observ’d the whole Body of
the Oyle in a coole place to thicken into the Consistence and Appearance of
white Butter, which with the least heat resum’d its Former Liquidness. In
the Oyl of Olive drawn over in a Retort, I have likewise more then once
seen a spontaneous Coagulation in the Receiver: And I have of it by me
thus Congeal’d; which is of such a strangely Penetrating scent, as if ’twould
Perforate the Noses that approach it. The like pungent Odour I also
observ’d in the Distill’d Liquor of common sope, which forc’d over from
Minium, lately afforded an oyle of a most admirable Penetrancy; And he
must be a great stranger, both to the Writings and preparations of Chymists,
that sees not in the Oyles they distill from Vegetables and Animals, a
considerable and obvious Difference. Nay I shall venture to add,
Eleutherius, (what perhaps you will think of kin to a Paradox) that divers
times out of the same Animal or Vegetable, there may be extracted Oyles of
Natures obviously differing. To which purpose I shall not insist on the
swimming and sinking Oyles, which I have sometimes observ’d to float on,
and subside under the spirit of Guajacum, and that of divers other
Vegetables Distill’d with a strong and lasting Fire; Nor shall I insist on the
observation elsewhere mention’d, of the divers and unminglable oyles
afforded us by Humane Blood long fermented and Digested with spirit of
Wine, because these kind of oyles may seem chiefly to differ in Consistence
and Weight, being all of them high colour’d and adust. But the Experiment
which I devis’d to make out this Difference of the oyles of the same
Vegetable, ad Oculum, (as they speak) was this that followes. I took a
pound of Annisseeds, and having grosly beaten them, caused them to be put
into a very large glass Retort almost filled with fair Water; and placing this
Retort in a sand Furnace, I caus’d a very Gentle heat to be administer’d
during the first day, and a great part of the second, till the Water was for the

most part drawn off, and had brought over with it at least most of the
Volatile and Aromatick Oyle of the seeds. And then encreasing the Fire, and
changing the Receiver, I obtain’d besides an Empyreumatical Spirit, a
quantity of adust oyle; whereof a little floated upon the Spirit, and the rest
was more heavy, and not easily separable from it. And whereas these oyles
were very dark, and smell’d (as Chymists speak) so strongly of the Fire,
that their Odour did not betray from what Vegetables they had been forc’d;
the other Aromatick Oyle was enrich’d with the genuine smell and tast of
the Concrete; and spontaneously coagulating it self into white butter did
manifest self to be the true Oyle of Annisseeds; which Concrete I therefore
chose to employ about this Experiment, that the Difference of these Oyles
might be more conspicuous then it would have been, had I instead of it
destill’d another Vegetable.
I had almost forgot to take notice, that there is another sort of Bodies, which
though not obtain’d from Concretes by Distillation, many Chymists are
wont to call their Sulphur; not only because such substances are, for the
most part, high colour’d (whence they are also, and that more properly,
called Tinctures) as dissolv’d Sulphurs are wont to be; but especially
because they are, for the most part, abstracted and separated from the rest of
the Masse by Spirit of Wine: which Liquor those men supposing to be
Sulphureous, they conclude, that what it works upon, and abstracts, must be
a Sulphur also. And upon this account they presume, that they can sequester
the sulphur even of Minerals and Metalls; from which ’tis known that they
cannot by Fire alone separate it. To all This I shall answer; That if these
sequestred substances where indeed the sulphurs of the Bodies whence they
are drawn, there would as well be a great Disparity betwixt Chymical
Sulphurs obtain’d by Spirit of Wine, as I have already shewn there is
betwixt those obtain’d by Distillation in the forme of Oyles: which will be
evident from hence, that not to urge that themselves ascribe distinct vertues
to Mineral Tinctures, extolling the Tincture of Gold against such and such
Diseases; the Tincture of Antimony, or of its Glass, against others; and the
Tincture of Emerauld against others; ’tis plain, that in Tinctures drawn from
Vegetables, if the superfluous spirit of Wine be distill’d off, it leaves at the
bottom that thicker substance which Chymists use to call the Extract of the
Vegetable. And that these Extracts are endow’d with very differing
Qualities according to the Nature of the Particular Bodies that afforded

them (though I fear seldom with so much of the specifick vertues as is wont
to be imagin’d) is freely confess’d both by Physitians and Chymists. But,
Eleutherius, (sayes Carneades) we may here take Notice that the Chymists
do as well in this case, as in many others, allow themselves a License to
abuse Words: For not again to argue from the differing properties of
Tinctures, that they are not exactly pure and Elementary Sulphurs; they
would easily appear not to be so much as Sulphur’s, although we should
allow Chymical Oyles to deserve that Name. For however in some Mineral
Tinctures the Natural fixtness of the extracted Body does not alwayes suffer
it to be easily further resoluble into differing substances; Yet in very many
extracts drawn from Vegetables, it may very easily be manifested that the
spirit of Wine has not sequestred the sulphureous Ingredient from the saline
and Mercurial ones; but has dissolv’d (for I take it to be a Solution) the
finer Parts of the Concrete (without making any nice distinction of their
being perfectly Sulphureous or not) and united it self with them into a kind
of Magistery; which consequently must contain Ingredients or Parts of
several sorts. For we see that the stones that are rich in vitriol, being often
drench’d with rain-Water, the Liquor will then extract a fine and transparent
substance coagulable into Vitriol; and yet though this Vitriol be readily
dissoluble in Water, it is not a true Elementary Salt, but, as You know, a
body resoluble into very differing Parts, whereof one (as I shall have
occasion to tell You anon) is yet of a Metalline, and consequently not of an
Elementary Nature. You may consider also, that common Sulphur is readily
dissoluble in Oyle of Turpentine, though notwithstanding its Name it
abounds as well, if not as much, in Salt as in true Sulphur; witness the great
quantity of saline Liquor it affords being set to flame away under a glasse
Bell. Nay I have, which perhaps You will think strange, with the same Oyle
of Turpentine alone easily enough dissolv’d crude Antimony finely
powder’d into a Blood-red Balsam, wherewith perhaps considerable things
may be perform’d in Surgery. And if it were now Requisite, I could tell You
of some other Bodies (such as Perhaps You would not suspect) that I have
been able to work upon with certain Chymical Oyles. But instead of
digressing further I shall make this use of the Example I have nam’d. That
’tis not unlikely, but that Spirit of Wine which by its pungent tast, and by
some other Qualities that argue it better (especially its Reduciblenesse,
according to Helmont, into Alcali, and Water,) seems to be as well of a
Saline as of a Sulphureous Nature, may well be suppos’d Capable of

Dissolving Substances That are not meerly Elementary sulphurs, though
perhaps they may abound with Parts that are of kin thereunto. For I find that
Spirit of Wine will dissolve Gumm Lacca, Benzoine, and the Resinous Parts
of Jallap, and even of Guaiacum; whence we may well suspect that it may
from Spices, Herbs, and other lesse compacted Vegetables, extract
substances that are not perfect Sulphurs but mixt Bodies. And to put it past
Dispute, there is many a Vulgar Extract drawn with Spirit of Wine, which
committed to Distillation will afford such differing substances as will
Loudly proclaim it to have been a very compounded Body. So that we may
justly suspect, that even in Mineral Tinctures it will not alwaies follow, that
because a red substance is drawn from the Concrete by spirit of Wine, that
Substance is its true and Elementary Sulphur. And though some of these
Extracts may perhaps be inflamable; Yet besides that others are not, and
besides that their being reduc’d to such Minuteness of Parts may much
facilitate their taking Fire; besides this, I say, We see that common Sulphur,
common Oyle, Gumm Lac, and many Unctuous and Resinous Bodies, will
flame well enough, though they be of very compounded natures: Nay
Travellers of Unsuspected Credit assure Us, as a known thing, that in some
Northern Countries where Firr trees and Pines abound, the poorer sort of
Inhabitants use Long splinters of those Resinous Woods to burne instead of
Candles. And as for the rednesse wont to be met with in such solutions, I
could easily shew, that ’tis not necessary it should proceed from the Sulphur
of the Concrete, Dissolv’d by the Spirit of Wine; if I had leasure to manifest
how much Chymists are wont to delude themselves and others by the
Ignorance of those other causes upon whose account spirit of Wine and
other Menstruums may acquire a red or some other high colour. But to
returne to our Chymical Oyles, supposing that they were exactly pure; Yet I
hope they would be, as the best spirit of Wine is, but the more inflamable
and deflagrable. And therefore since an Oyle can be by the Fire alone
immediately turn’d into flame, which is something of a very differing
Nature from it: I shall Demand how this Oyle can be a Primogeneal and
Incorruptible Body, as most Chymists would have their Principles; Since it
is further resoluble into flame, which whether or no it be a portion of the
Element of Fire, as an Aristotelian would conclude, is certainly something
of a very differing Nature from a Chymical Oyle, since it burnes, and
shines, and mounts swiftly upwards; none of which a Chymical Oyle does,
whilst it continues such. And if it should be Objected, that the Dissipated

Parts of this flaming Oyle may be caught and collected again into Oyl or
Sulphur; I shall demand, what Chymist appears to have ever done it; and
without Examining whether it may not hence be as well said that sulphur is
but compacted Fire, as that Fire is but diffus’d Sulphur, I shall leave you to
consider whether it may not hence be argu’d, that neither Fire nor Sulphur
are primitive and indestructible Bodies; and I shall further observe that, at
least it will hence appear that a portion of matter may without being
Compounded with new Ingredients, by having the Texture and Motion of its
small parts chang’d, be easily, by the means of the Fire, endow’d with new
Qualities, more differing from them it had before, then are those which
suffice to discriminate the Chymists Principles from one another.
We are next to Consider, whether in the Anatomy of mixt Bodies, that
which Chymists call the Mercurial part of them be un-compounded, or no.
But to tell You True, though Chymists do Unanimously affirm that their
Resolutions discover a Principle, which they call Mercury, yet I find them
to give of it Descriptions so Differing, and so Ænigmaticall, that I, who am
not asham’d to confess that I cannot understand what is not sence, must
acknowledge to you that I know not what to make of them. Paracelsus
himself, and therefore, as you will easily believe, many of his Followers,
does somewhere call that Mercury which ascends upon the burning of
Wood, as the Peripateticks are wont to take the same smoke for Air; and so
seems to define Mercury by Volatility, or (if I may coyne such a Word)
Effumability. But since, in this Example, both Volatile Salt and Sulphur
make part of the smoke, which does indeed consist also both of
Phlegmatick and Terrene Corpuscles, this Notion is not to be admitted; And
I find that the more sober Chymists themselves disavow it. Yet to shew you
how little of clearness we are to expect in the accounts even of latter
Spagyrists, be pleas’d to take notice, that Beguinus, even in his Tyrocinium
Chymicum, Chm. Tyrocin. lib. 1. Cap. 2. written for the Instruction of Novices,
when he comes to tell us what are meant by the Tria Prima, which for their
being Principles ought to be defin’d the more accurately and plainly, gives
us this Description of Mercury; Mercurius (sayes he) est liquor ille acidus,
permeabilis, penetrabilis, æthereus, ac purissimus, a quo omnis Nutricatio,
Sensus, Motus, Vires, Colores, Senectutisque Præproperæ retardatio. Which
words are not so much a Definition of it, as an Encomium: and yet
Quercetanus in his Description of the same Principle adds to these, divers

other Epithets. But both of them, to skip very many other faults that may be
found with their Metaphoricall Descriptions, speak incongruously to the
Chymists own Principles. For if Mercury be an Acid Liquor, either
Hermetical Philosophy must err in ascribing all Tasts to Salt, or else
Mercury must not be a Principle, but Compounded of a Saline Ingredient
and somewhat else. Libavius, though he find great fault with the obscurity
of what the Chymists write concerning their Mercurial Principle, does yet
but give us such a Negative Description of it, as Sennertus, how favourable
soever to the Tria Prima, is not satisfi’d with. And this Sennertus Himself,
though the Learnedst Champion for the Hypostatical Principles, does
almost as frequently as justly complain of the unsatisfactoriness of what the
Chymists teach concerning their Mercury; and yet he himself (but with his
wonted modesty) Substitutes instead of the Description of Libavius,
another, which many Readers, especially if they be not Peripateticks, will
not know what to make of. For scarce telling us any more, then that in all
bodies that which is found besides Salt and Sulphur, and the Elements, or,
as they call them, Phlegm and Dead Earth, is that Spirit which in Aristotles
Language may be call’d ουσιαν αναλογον τω των αϛρων ϛοιχαιω. He sayes
that which I confess is not at all satisfactory to me, who do not love to seem
to acquiesce in any mans Mystical Doctrines, that I may be thought to
understand them.
If (sayes Eleutherius) I durst presume that the same thing would be thought
clear by me, and those that are fond of such cloudy Expressions as You
justly Tax the Chymists for, I should venture to offer to Consideration,
whether or no, since the Mercurial Principle that arises from Distillation is
unanimously asserted to be distinct from the salt and Sulphur of the same
Concrete, that may not be call’d the Mercury of a Body, which though it
ascend in Distillation, as do the Phlegme and Sulphur, is neither insipid like
the former, nor inflamable like the latter. And therefore I would substitute to
the too much abused Name of Mercury, the more clear and Familiar
Appellation of Spirit, which is also now very much made use of even by the
Chymists themselves, of our times, though they have not given us so
Distinct an Explication, as were fit, of what may be call’d the Spirit of a
mixt Body.
I should not perhaps (sayes Carneades) much quarrel with your Notion of
Mercury. But as for the Chymists, what they can mean, with congruity to

their own Principles, by the Mercury of Animals and Vegetables, ’twill not
be so easie to find out; for they ascribe Tasts only to the Saline Principle,
and consequently would be much put to it to shew what Liquor it is, in the
Resolution of Bodies, that not being insipid, for that they call Phlegme,
neither is inflamable as Oyle or Sulphur, nor has any Tast; which according
to them must proceed from a Mixture, at least, of Salt. And if we should
take Spirit in the sence of the Word receiv’d among Modern Chymists and
Physitians, for any Distill’d Liquor that is neither Phlegme nor oyle, the
Appellation would yet appear Ambiguous enough. For, plainly, that which
first ascends in the Distillation of Wine and Fermented Liquors, is generally
as well by Chymists as others reputed a Spirit. And yet pure Spirit of Wine
being wholly inflamable ought according to them to be reckon’d to the
Sulphureous, not the Mercurial Principle. And among the other Liquors that
go under the name of Spirits, there are divers which seem to belong to the
family of Salts, such as are the Spirits of Nitre, Vitriol, Sea-Salt and others,
and even the Spirit of Harts-horn, being, as I have try’d, in great part, if not
totally reducible into Salt and Phlegme, may be suspected to be but a
Volatile Salt disguis’d by the Phlegme mingl’d with it into the forme of a
Liquor. However if this be a Spirit, it manifestly differs very much from
that of Vinager, the Tast of the one being Acid, and the other Salt, and their
Mixture in case they be very pure, sometimes occasioning an Effervescence
like that of those Liquors the Chymists count most contrary to one another.
And even among those Liquors that seem to have a better title then those
hitherto mention’d, to the name of Spirits, there appears a sensible
Diversity; For spirit of Oak, for instance, differs from that of Tartar, and this
from that of Box, or of Guaiacum. And in short, even these spirits as well as
other Distill’d Liquors manifest a great Disparity betwixt themselves, either
in their Actions on our senses, or in their other operations.
And (continues Carneades) besides this Disparity that is to be met with
among those Liquors that the Modernes call spirits, & take for similar
bodies, what I have formerly told you concerning the Spirit of Box-wood
may let you see that some of those Liquors not only have qualities very
differing from others, but may be further resolved into substances differing
from one another.
And since many moderne Chymists and other Naturalists are pleased to take
the Mercurial spirit of Bodies for the same Principle, under differing names,

I must invite you to observe, with me, the great difference that is
conspicuous betwixt all the Vegetable and Animal spirits I have mention’d
and running Mercury. I speak not of that which is commonly sold in shops
that many of themselves will confesse to be a mixt Body; but of that which
is separated from Metals, which by some Chymists that seem more
Philosophers then the rest, and especially by the above mentioned Claveus,
is (for distinction sake) called Mercurius Corporum. Now this Metalline
Liquor being one of those three Principles of which Mineral Bodies are by
Spagyrists affirmed to be compos’d and to be resoluble into them, the many
notorious Differences betwixt them and the Mercuries, as They call Them,
of Vegetables and Animals will allow me to inferr, either that Minerals and
the other two sorts of Mixt Bodies consist not of the same Elements, or that
those Principles whereinto Minerals are immediately resolved, which
Chymists with great ostentation shew us as the true principles, of them, are
but Secundary Principles, or Mixts of a peculiar sort, which must be
themselves reduc’d to a very differing forme, to be of the same kind with
Vegetable and Animal Liquors.
But this is not all; for although I formerly told You how Little Credit there
is to be given to the Chymical Processes commonly to be met with, of
Extracting the Mercuries of Metals, Yet I will now add, that supposing that
the more Judicious of Them do not untruly affirme that they have really
drawn true and running Mercury from several Metals (which I wish they
had cleerly taught Us how to do also,) yet it may be still doubted whether
such extracted Mercuries do not as well differ from common Quicksilver,
and from one another, as from the Mercuries of Vegetables and Animalls.
Claveus, Dixi autem de argento vivo a metallis prolicito, quod vulgare ob nimiam frigiditatem
& humiditatem nimium concoctioni est contumax, nec ab auro solum alterato coerceri potest.
Gast. Clave. in Apoll. in his Apology, speaking of some experiments whereby
Metalline Mercuries may be fixt into the nobler metals, adds, that he spake
of the Mercuries drawn from metals; because common Quicksilver by
reason of its excessive coldnesse and moisture is unfit for that particular
kind of operation; for which though a few lines before he prescribes in
general the Mercuries of Metalline Bodies, yet he chiefly commends that
drawn by art from silver. And elsewhere, in the same Book, he tells us, that
he himself tryed, that by bare coction the quicksilver of Tin or Pewter
(argentum vivum ex stanno prolicitum) may by an efficient cause, as he

speaks, be turn’d into pure Gold. And the Experienc’d Alexander van
Suchten, somewhere tells us, that by a way he intimates may be made a
Mercury of Copper, not of the Silver colour of other Mercuries, but green;
to which I shall add, that an eminent person, whose name his travells and
learned writings have made famous, lately assur’d me that he had more then
once seen the Mercury of Lead (which whatever Authors promise, you will
find it very difficult to make, at least in any considerable quantity) fixt into
perfect Gold. And being by me demanded whether or no any other Mercury
would not as well have been changed by the same Operations, he assured
me of the Negative.
And since I am fallen upon the mention of the Mercuries of metals, you will
perhaps expect (Eleutherius!) that I should say something of their two other
principles; but must freely confess to you, that what Disparity there may be
between the salts and sulphurs of Metals and other Menerals, I am not my
self experienced enough in the separations and examens of them, to venture
to determine: (for as for the salts of Metals, I formerly represented it as a
thing much to be question’d, whether they have any at all:) And for the
processes of separation I find in Authors, if they were (what many of them
are not) successfully practicable, as I noted above, yet they are to be
performed by the assistance of other bodies, so hardly, if upon any termes at
all, separable from them, that it is very difficult to give the separated
principles all their due, and no more. But the Sulphur of Antimony which is
vehemently vomitive, and the strongly scented Anodyne Sulphur of Vitriol
inclines me to think that not only Mineral Sulphurs differ from Vegetable
ones, but also from one another, retaining much of the nature of their
Concretes. The salts of metals, and of some sort of minerals, You will easily
guesse by the Doubts I formerly express’d, whether metals have any salt at
all, that I have not been so happy as yet to see, perhaps not for want of
curiosity. But if Paracelsus did alwaies write so consentaneously to himself
that his opinion were confidently to be collected from every place of his
writings where he seems to expresse it, I might safely take upon me to tell
you, that he both countenances in general what I have delivered in my
Fourth main consideration, and in particular warrants me to suspect that
there may be a difference in metalline and mineral Salts, as well as we find
it in those of other bodies. For, Sulphur (sayes he) Paracel. de Mineral. Tract. 1.
pag. 141. aliud in auro, aliud in argento, aliud in ferro, aliud in plumbo,

stanno, &c. sic aliud in Saphiro, aliud in Smaragdo, aliud in rubino,
chrysolito, amethisto, magnete, &c. Item aliud in lapidibus, silice, salibus,
fontibus, &c. nec vero tot sulphura tantum, sed & totidem salia; sal aliud in
metallis, aliud in gemmis, aliud in lapidibus, aliud in salibus, aliud in
vitriolo, aliud in alumine: similis etiam Mercurii est ratio. Alius in Metallis,
alius in Gemmis, &c. Ita ut unicuique speciei suus peculiaris Mercurius sit.
Et tamen res saltem tres sunt; una essentia est sulphur; una est sal; una est
Mercurius. Addo quod & specialius adhuc singula dividantur; aurum enim
non unum, sed multiplex, ut et non unum pyrum, pomum, sed idem
multiplex; totidem etiam sulphura auri, salia auri, mercurii auri; idem
competit etiam metallis & gemmis; ut quot saphyri præstantiores, lævioris,
&c. tot etiam saphyrica sulphura, saphyrica salia, saphyrici Mercurii, &c.
Idem verum etiam est de turconibus & gemmis aliis universis. From which
passage (Eleutherius) I suppose you will think I might without rashness
conclude, either that my opinion is favoured by that of Paracelsus, or that
Paracelsus his opinion was not alwaies the same. But because in divers
other places of his writings he seems to talk at a differing rate of the three
Principles and the four Elements, I shall content my self to inferr from the
alledg’d passage, that if his doctrine be not consistent with that Part of mine
which it is brought to countenance, it is very difficult to know what his
opinion concerning salt, sulphur and mercury, was; and that consequently
we had reason about the beginning of our conferences, to decline taking
upon us, either to examine or oppose it.
I know not whether I should on this occasion add, that those very bodies the
Chymists call Phlegme and Earth do yet recede from an Elementary
simplicity. That common Earth and Water frequently do so, notwithstanding
the received contrary opinion, is not deny’d by the more wary of the
moderne Peripateticks themselves: and certainly, most Earths are much
lesse simple bodies then is commonly imagined even by Chymists, who do
not so consideratly to prescribe and employ Earths Promiscuously in those
distillations that require the mixture of some caput mortuum, to hinder the
flowing together of the matter, and to retain its grosser parts. For I have
found some Earths to yield by distillation a Liquor very far from being
inodorous or insipid; and ’tis a known observation, that most kinds of fat
Earth kept cover’d from the rain, and hindred from spending themselves in

the production of vegetables, will in time become impregnated with Salt-
Petre.
But I must remember that the Water and Earths I ought here to speak of, are
such as are separated from mixt Bodies by the fire; and therefore to restrain
my Discourse to such, I shall tell you, That we see the Phlegme of Vitriol
(for instance) is a very effectual remedie against burnes; and I know a very
Famous and experienc’d Physitian, whose unsuspected secret (himself
confess’d to me) it is, for the discussing of hard and Obstinate Tumours.
The Phlegme of Vinager, though drawn exceeding leasurly in a digesting
Furnace, I have purposely made tryall of; and sometimes found it able to
draw, though slowly, a saccharine sweetness out of Lead; and as I remember
by long Digestion, I dissolv’d Corpals in it. The Phlegme of the sugar of
Saturne is said to have very peculiar properties. Divers Eminent Chymists
teach, that it will dissolve Pearls, which being precipitated by the spirit of
the same concrete are thereby (as they say) rendred volatile; which has been
confirmed to me, upon his own observation, by a person of great veracity.
The Phlegme of Wine, and indeed divers other Liquors that are
indiscriminately condemnd to be cast away as phlegm, are endow’d with
qualities that make them differ both from meer water, and from each other;
and whereas the Chymists are pleas’d to call the caput mortuum of what
they have distill’d (after they have by affusion of water drawn away its salt)
terra damnata, or Earth, it may be doubted whether or no those earths are
all of them perfectly alike: and it is scarce to be doubted, but that there are
some of them which remain yet unreduc’d to an Elementary nature. The
ashes of wood depriv’d of all the salt, and bone-Ashes, or calcin’d Harts-
horn, which Refiners choose to make Tests of, as freest from Salt, seem
unlike: and he that shall compare either of these insipid ashes to Lime, and
much more to the calx of Talk (though by the affusion of water they be
exquisitely dulcify’d) will perhaps see cause to think them things of a
somewhat differing nature. And it is evident in Colcothar that the exactest
calcination, follow’d by an exquisite dulcification, does not alwaies reduce
the remaining body into elementary earth; for after the salt or Vitriol (if the
Calcination have been too faint) is drawn out of the Colcothar, the residue is
not earth, but a mixt body, rich in Medical vertues (as experience has
inform’d me) and which Angelus Sala affirmes to be partly reducible into
malleable Copper; which I judge very probable: for though when I was

making Experiments upon Colcothar, I was destitute of a Furnace capable
of giving a heat intense Enough to bring such a Calx to Fusion; yet having
conjectur’d that if Colcothar abounded with that Metal, Aqua Fortis would
find it out there, I put some dulcifi’d Colcothar into that Menstruum, and
found the Liquor, according to my Expectation, presently Colour’d as
Highly as if it had been an Ordinary Solution of Copper.

THE

SCEPTICAL CHYMIST.

The Fifth Part.

H Ere Carneades making a pause, I must not deny (sayes his Friend to
him) that I think You have sufficiently prov’d that these distinct
Substances which Chymists are wont to obtain from Mixt Bodies, by their
Vulgar Destillation, are not pure and simple enough to deserve, in Rigour of
speaking, the Name of Elements, or Principles. But I suppose You have
heard, that there are some Modern Spagyrists, who give out that they can by
further and more Skilfull Purifications, so reduce the separated Ingredients
of Mixt Bodies to an Elementary simplicity, That the Oyles (for Instance)
extracted from all Mixts shall as perfectly resemble one another, as the
Drops of Water do.
If you remember (replies Carneades) that at the Beginning of our
Conference with Philoponus, I declar’d to him before the rest of the
Company, that I would not engage my self at present to do any more then
examine the usual proofs alledg’d by Chymists, for the Vulgar doctrine of
their three Hypostatical Principles; You will easily perceive that I am not
oblig’d to make answer to what you newly propos’d; and that it rather
grants, then disproves what I have been contending for: Since by pretending
to make so great a change in the reputed Principles that Destillation affords
the common Spagyrists, ’tis plainly enough presuppos’d, that before such
Artificial Depurations be made, the Substances to be made more simple
were not yet simple enough to be look’d upon as Elementary; Wherefore in
case the Artists you speak of could perform what they give out they can, yet
I should not need to be asham’d of having question’d the Vulgar Opinion
touching the tria Prima. And as to the thing it self, I shall freely
acknowledge to you, that I love not to be forward in determining things to
be impossible, till I know and have consider’d the means by which they are
propos’d to be effected. And therefore I shall not peremptorily deny either
the possibility of what these Artists promise, or my Assent to any just
Inference; however destructive to my Conjectures, that may be drawn from
their performances. But give me leave to tell you withall, that because such

promises are wont (as Experience has more then once inform’d me) to be
much more easily made, then made good by Chymists, I must withhold my
Beliefe from their assertions, till their Experiments exact it; and must not be
so easie as to expect before hand, an unlikely thing upon no stronger
Inducements then are yet given me: Besides that I have not yet found by
what I have heard of these Artists, that though they pretend to bring the
several Substances into which the Fire has divided the Concrete, to an
exquisite simplicity, They pretend also to be able by the Fire to divide all
Concretes, Minerals, and others, into the same number of Distinct
Substances. And in the mean time I must think it improbable, that they can
either truly separate as many differing Bodies from Gold (for Instance) or
Osteocolla, as we can do from Wine, or Vitriol; or that the Mercury (for
Example) of Gold or Saturn would be perfectly of the same Nature with that
of Harts-horn; and that the sulphur of Antimony would be but Numerically
different from the Distill’d butter or oyle of Roses.
But suppose (sayes Eleutherius) that you should meet with Chymists, who
would allow you to take in Earth and Water into the number of the
principles of Mixt Bodies; and being also content to change the Ambiguous
Name of Mercury for that more intelligible one of spirit, should
consequently make the principles of Compound Bodies to be Five; would
you not think it something hard to reject so plausible an Opinion, only
because the Five substances into which the Fire divides mixt Bodies are not
exactly pure, and Homogeneous? For my part (Continues Carneades) I
cannot but think it somewhat strange, in case this Opinion be not true, that
it should fall out so luckily, that so great a Variety of Bodies should be
Analyz’d by the Fire into just five Distinct substances; which so little
differing from the Bodies that bear those names, may so Plausibly be call’d
Oyle, Spirit, Salt, Water, and Earth.
The Opinion You now propose (answers Carneades) being another then that
I was engag’d to examine, it is not requisite for me to Debate it at present;
nor should I have leisure to do it thorowly. Wherefore I shall only tell you
in General, that though I think this Opinion in some respects more
defensible then that of the Vulgar Chymists; yet you may easily enough
learn from the past Discourse what may be thought of it: Since many of the
Objections made against the Vulgar Doctrine of the Chymists seem, without
much alteration, employable against this Hypothesis also. For, besides that

this Doctrine does as well as the other take it for granted, (what is not easie
to be prov’d) that the Fire is the true and Adequate Analyzer of Bodies, and
that all the Distinct substances obtainable from a mixt Body by the Fire,
were so pre-existent in it, that they were but extricated from each other by
the Analysis; Besides that this Opinion, too, ascribe to the Productions of
the Fire an Elementary simplicity, which I have shewn not to belong to
them; and besides that this Doctrine is lyable to some of the other
Difficulties, wherewith That of the Tria Prima is incumber’d; Besides all
this, I say, this quinary number of Elements, (if you pardon the Expression)
ought at least to have been restrain’d to the Generality of Animal and
Vegetable Bodies, since not only among these there are some Bodies (as I
formerly argu’d) which, for ought has yet been made to appear, do consist,
either of fewer or more similar substances then precisely Five. But in the
Mineral Kingdom, there is scarce one Concrete that has been evinc’d to be
adequatly divisible into such five Principles or Elements, and neither more
nor less, as this Opinion would have every mixt Body to consist of.
And this very thing (continues Carneades) may serve to take away or lessen
your Wonder, that just so many Bodies as five should be found upon the
Resolution of Concretes. For since we find not that the fire can make any
such Analysis (into five Elements) of Metals and other Mineral Bodies,
whose Texture is more strong and permanent, it remains that the Five
Substances under consideration be Obtain’d from Vegetable and Animal
Bodies, which (probably by reason of their looser Contexture) are capable
of being Distill’d. And as to such Bodies, ’tis natural enough, that, whether
we suppose that there are, or are not, precisely five Elements, there should
ordinarily occurr in the Dissipated parts a five Fold Diversity of Scheme (if
I may so speak.) For if the Parts do not remain all fix’d, as in Gold,
Calcin’d Talck, &c. nor all ascend, as in the Sublimation of Brimstone,
Camphire, &c. but after their Dissipation do associate themselves into new
Schemes of Matter; it is very likely, that they will by the Fire be divided
into fix’d and Volatile (I mean, in Reference to that degree of heat by which
they are destill’d) and those Volatile parts will, for the most part, ascend
either in a dry forme, which Chymists are pleas’d to call, if they be Tastless,
Flowers; if Sapid, Volatile Salt; or in a Liquid Forme. And this Liquor must
be either inflamable, and so pass for oyl, or not inflamable, and yet subtile
and pungent, which may be call’d Spirit; or else strengthless or insipid,

which may be nam’d Phlegme, or Water. And as for the fixt part, or Caput
Mortuum, it will most commonly consist of Corpuscles, partly Soluble in
Water, or Sapid, (especially if the Saline parts were not so Volatile, as to fly
away before) which make up its fixt salt; and partly insoluble and insipid,
which therefore seems to challenge the name of Earth. But although upon
this ground one might easily enough have foretold, that the differing
substances obtain’d from a perfectly mixt Body by the Fire would for the
most part be reducible to the five newly mentioned States of Matter; yet it
will not presently follow, that these five Distinct substances were simple
and primogeneal bodies, so pre-existent in the Concrete that the fire does
but take them asunder. Besides that it does not appear, that all Mixt Bodies,
(witness, Gold, Silver, Mercury, &c.) Nay nor perhaps all Vegetables, which
may appear by what we said above of Camphire, Benzoin, &c. are resoluble
by Fire into just such differing Schemes of Matter. Nor will the
Experiments formerly alledg’d permit us to look upon these separated
Substances as Elementary, or uncompounded. Neither will it be a sufficient
Argument of their being Bodies that deserve the Names which Chymists are
pleas’d to give them, that they have an Analogy in point of Consistence, or
either Volatility or Fixtness, or else some other obvious Quality, with the
suppos’d Principles, whose names are ascrib’d to them. For, as I told you
above, notwithstanding this Resemblance in some one Quality, there may
be such a Disparity in others, as may be more fit to give them Differing
Appellations, then the Resemblance is to give them one and the same. And
indeed it seems but somewhat a gross Way of judging of the Nature of
Bodies, to conclude without Scruple, that those must be of the same Nature
that agree in some such General Quality, as Fluidity, Dryness, Volatility, and
the like: since each of those Qualities, or States of Matter, may Comprehend
a great Variety of Bodies, otherwise of a very differing Nature; as we may
see in the Calxes of Gold, of Vitriol, and of Venetian Talck, compar’d with
common Ashes, which yet are very dry, and fix’d by the vehemence of the
Fire, as well as they. And as we may likewise gather from what I have
formerly Observ’d, touching the Spirit of Box-Wood, which though a
Volatile, Sapid, and not inflamable Liquor, as well as the Spirits of Harts-
horn, of Blood and others, (and therefore has been hitherto call’d, the Spirit,
and esteem’d for one of the Principles of the Wood that affords it;) may yet,
as I told You, be subdivided into two Liquors, differing from one another,
and one of them at least, from the Generality of other Chymical Spirits.

But you may your self, if you please, (pursues Carneades) accommodate to
the Hypothesis you propos’d what other particulars you shall think
applicable to it, in the foregoing Discourse. For I think it unseasonable for
me to meddle now any further with a Controversie, which since it does not
now belong to me, Leaves me at Liberty to Take my Own time to Declare
my Self about it.
Eleutherius perceiving that Carneades was somewhat unwilling to spend
any more time upon the debate of this Opinion, and having perhaps some
thoughts of taking hence a Rise to make him Discourse it more fully
another time, thought not fit as then to make any further mention to him of
the propos’d opinion, but told him;
I presume I need not mind you, Carneades, That both the Patrons of the
ternary number of Principles, and those that would have five Elements,
endeavour to back their experiments with a specious Reason or two; and
especially some of those Embracers of the Opinion last nam’d (whom I
have convers’d with, and found them Learned men) assigne this Reason of
the necessity of five distinct Elements; that otherwise mixt Bodies could not
be so compounded and temper’d as to obtain a due consistence and
competent Duration. For Salt (say they) is the Basis of Solidity; and
Permanency in Compound Bodies, without which the other four Elements
might indeed be variously and loosly blended together, but would remain
incompacted; but that Salt might be dissolv’d into minute Parts, and
convey’d to the other Substances to be compacted by it, and with it, there is
a Necessity of Water. And that the mixture may not be too hard and brittle, a
Sulphureous or Oyly Principle must intervene to make the mass more
tenacious; to this a Mercurial spirit must be superadded; which by its
activity may for a while premeate, and as it were leaven the whole Mass,
and thereby promote the more exquisite mixture and incorporation of the
Ingredients. To all which (lastly) a portion of Earth must be added, which
by its drinesse and poracity may soak up part of that water wherein the Salt
was dissolv’d, and eminently concurr with the other ingredients to give the
whole body the requisite consistence.
I perceive (sayes Carneades smiling) that if it be true, as ’twas lately rooted
from the Proverb, That good Wits have bad Memories, You have that Title,
as well as a better, to a place among the good Wits. For you have already

more then once forgot, that I declar’d to you that I would at this Conference
Examine only the Experiments of my Adversaries, not their Speculative
Reasons. Yet ’tis not (Subjoynes Carneades) for fear of medling with the
Argument you have propos’d, that I decline the examining it at present. For
if when we are more at leasure, you shall have a mind that we may
Solemnly consider of it together; I am confident we shall scarce find it
insoluble. And in the mean time we may observe, that such a way of
Arguing may, it seems, be speciously accommodated to differing
Hypotheses. For I find that Beguinus, and other Assertors of the Tria Prima,
pretend to make out by such a way, the requisiteness of their Salt, Sulphur
and Mercury, to constitute mixt Bodies, without taking notice of any
necessity of an Addition of Water and Earth.
And indeed neither sort of Chymists seem to have duly consider’d how
great Variety there is in the Textures and Consistences of Compound Bodie;
sand how little the consistence and Duration of many of them seem to
accommodate and be explicable by the propos’d Notion. And not to
mention those almost incorruptible Substances obtainable by the Fire,
which I have prov’d to be somewhat compounded, and which the Chymists
will readily grant not to be perfectly mixt Bodies: (Not to mention these, I
say) If you will but recall to mind some of those Experiments, whereby I
shew’d You that out of common Water only mixt Bodies (and even living
ones) of very differing consistences, and resoluble by Fire into as many
Principles as other bodies acknowledg’d to be perfectly mixt; if you do this,
I say, you will not, I suppose, be averse from beleeving, that Nature by a
convenient disposition of the minute parts of a portion of matter may
contrive bodies durable enough, and of this, or that, or the other
Consistence, without being oblig’d to make use of all, much less of any
Determinate quantity of each of the five Elements, or of the three Principles
to compound such bodies of. And I have (pursues Carneades) something
wonder’d, Chymists should not consider, that there is scarce any body in
Nature so permanent and indissoluble as Glass; which yet themselves teach
us may be made of bare Ashes, brought to fusion by the meer Violence of
the Fire; so that, since Ashes are granted to consist but of pure Salt and
simple Earth, sequestred from all the other Principles or Elements, they
must acknowledge, That even Art it self can of two Elements only, or, if you
please, one Principle and one Element, compound a Body more durable

then almost any in the World. Which being undeniable, how will they prove
that Nature cannot compound Mixt Bodies, and even durable Ones, under
all the five Elements or material Principles.
But to insist any longer on this Occasional Disquisition, Touching their
Opinion that would Establish five Elements, were to remember as little as
You did before, that the Debate of this matter is no part of my first
undertaking; and consequently, that I have already spent time enough in
what I look back upon but as a digression, or at best an Excursion.
And thus, Eleutherius, (sayes Carneades) having at length gone through the
four Considerations I propos’d to Discourse unto you, I hold it not unfit, for
fear my having insisted so long on each of them may have made you forget
their Series, briefly to repeat them by telling you, that
Since, in the first place, it may justly be doubted whether or no the Fire be,
as Chymists suppose it, the genuine and Universal Resolver of mixt Bodies;
Since we may doubt, in the next place, whether or no all the Distinct
Substances that may be obtain’d from a mixt body by the Fire were pre-
existent there in the formes in which they were separated from it;
Since also, though we should grant the Substances separable from mixt
Bodies by the fire to have been their component Ingredients, yet the
Number of such substances does not appear the same in all mixt Bodies;
some of them being Resoluble into more differing substances than three,
and Others not being Resoluble into so many as three.
And Since, Lastly, those very substances that are thus separated are not for
the most part pure and Elementary bodies, but new kinds of mixts;
Since, I say, these things are so, I hope you will allow me to inferr, that the
Vulgar Experiments (I might perchance have Added, the Arguments too)
wont to be Alledg’d by Chymists to prove, that their three Hypostatical
Principles do adequately compose all mixt Bodies, are not so demonstrative
as to reduce a wary Person to acquiesce in their Doctrine, which, till they
Explain and prove it better, will by its perplexing darkness be more apt to
puzzle then satisfy considering men, and will to them appear incumbred
with no small Difficulties.

And from what has been hitherto deduc’d (continues Carneades) we may
Learn, what to Judge of the common Practice of those Chymists, who
because they have found that Diverse compound Bodies (for it will not hold
in All) can be resolv’d into, or rather can be brought to afford two or three
differing Substances more then the Soot and Ashes, whereinto the naked
fire commonly divides them in our Chymnies, cry up their own Sect for the
Invention of a New Philosophy, some of them, as Helmont, &c. styling
themselves Philosophers by the Fire; and the most part not only ascribing,
but as far as in them lies, engrossing to those of their Sect the Title of
PHILOSOPHERS.
But alas, how narrow is this Philosophy, that reaches but to some of those
compound Bodies, which we find but upon, or in the crust or outside of our
terrestrial Globe, which is it self but a point in comparison of the vast
extended Universe, of whose other and greater parts the Doctrine of the Tria
Prima does not give us an Account! For what does it teach us, either of the
Nature of the Sun, which Astronomers affirme to be eight-score and odd
times bigger then the whole Earth? or of that of those numerous fixt Starrs,
which, for ought we know, would very few, if any of them, appear inferiour
in bulke and brightness to the Sun, if they were as neer us as He? What does
the knowing that Salt, sulphur and Mercury, are the Principles of Mixt
Bodies, informe us of the Nature of that vast, fluid, and Ætherial Substance,
that seemes to make up the interstellar, and consequently much the greatest
part of the World? for as for the opinion commonly ascrib’d to Paracelsus,
as if he would have not only the four Peripatetick Elements, but even the
Celestial parts of the Universe to consist of his three Principles, since the
modern Chymists themselves have not thought so groundless a conceit
worth their owning, I shall not think it Worth my confuting.
But I should perchance forgive the Hypothesis I have been all this while
examining, if, though it reaches but to a very little part of the World, it did
at least give us a satisfactory account of those things to which ’tis said to
reach. But I find not, that it gives us any other then a very imperfect
information even about mixt Bodies themselves: For how will the
knowledge of the Tria Prima discover to us the Reason, why the Loadstone
drawes a Needle and disposes it to respect the Poles, and yet seldom
precisely points at them? how will this Hypothesis teach Us how a Chick is
formed in the Egge, or how the Seminal Principles of Mint, Pompions, and

other Vegitables, that I mention’d to You above, can fashion Water into
Various Plants, each of them endow’d with its peculiar and determinate
shape, and with divers specifick and discriminating Qualities? How does
this Hypothesis shew us, how much Salt, how much Sulphur, and how
much Mercury must be taken to make a Chick or a Pompion? and if We
know that, what Principle is it, that manages these Ingredients, and
contrives (for instance) such Liquors as the White and Yelk of an Egge into
such a variety of Textures as is requisite to fashion the Bones, Veines,
Arteries, Nerves, Tendons, Feathers, Blood, and other parts of a Chick; and
not only to fashion each Limbe, but to connect them altogether, after that
manner that is most congruous to the perfection of the Animal which is to
Consist of Them? For to say, that some more fine and subtile part of either
or all the Hypostatical Principles is the Director in all this business, and the
Architect of all this Elaborate structure, is to give one occasion to demand
again, what proportion and way of mixture of the Tria Prima afforded this
Architectonick Spirit, and what Agent made so skilful and happy a mixture?
And the Answer to this Question, if the Chymists will keep themselves
within their three Principles, will be lyable to the same Inconvenience, that
the Answer to the former was. And if it were not to intrench upon the
Theame of a Friend of ours here present, I could easily prosecute the
Imperfections of the Vulgar Chymists Philosophy, and shew you, that by
going about to explicate by their three Principles, I say not, all the abstruse
Properties of mixt Bodies, but even such Obvious and more familiar
Phænomena as Fluidity and Firmness, The Colours and Figures of Stones,
Minerals, and other compound Bodies, The Nutrition of either Plants or
Animals, the Gravity of Gold or Quicksilver compar’d with Wine or Spirit
of Wine; By attempting, I say, to render a reason of these (to omit a
thousand others as difficult to account for) from any proportion of the three
simple Ingredients, Chymists will be much more likely to discredit
themselves and their Hypothesis, then satisfy an intelligent Inquirer after
Truth.
But (interposes Eleutherus) This Objection seems no more then may be
made against the four Peripatetick Elements. And indeed almost against any
other Hypothesis, that pretends by any Determinate Number of Material
Ingredients to render a reason of the Phænomena of Nature. And as for the
use of the Chymical Doctrine of the three Principles, I suppose you need

not be told by me, that The great Champion of it, The Learned
Sennertus, Senn. de Cons. & Dissen. p. 165. assignes this noble use of the Tria
Prima, That from Them, as the neerest and most Proper Principles, may be
Deduc’d and Demonstrated the Properties which are in Mixt Bodies, and
which cannot be Proximately (as They speak) deduc’d from the Elements.
And This, sayes he, is chiefly Apparent, when we Inquire into the Properties
and Faculties of Medecines. And I know (continues Eleutherius) That the
Person You have assum’d, of an Opponent of the Hermetick Doctrine, will
not so far prevaile against your Native and wonted Equity, as To keep You
from acknowledging that Philosophy is much beholden to the Notions and
Discoveries of Chymists.
If the Chymists You speak of (Replyes Carneades) had been so modest, or
so Discreet, as to propose their Opinion of the Tria Prima, but as a Notion
useful among Others, to increase Humane knowledge, they had deserv’d
more of our thanks; and less of our Opposition; but since the Thing that
they pretend is not so much to contribute a Notion toward the Improvement
of Philosophy, as to make this Notion attended by a few lesse considerable
ones) pass for a New Philosophy itself. Nay, since they boast so much of
this phancie of theirs, that the famous Quercetanus scruples not to write,
that if his most certain Doctrine of the three Principles were sufficiently
Learned, Examin’d, and Cultivated, it would easily Dispel all the Darkness
that benights our minds, and bring in a Clear Light, that would remove all
Difficulties. This School affording Theorems and Axiomes irrefragable, and
to be admitted without Dispute by impartial Judges; and so useful withal, as
to exempt us from the necessity of having recourse, for want of the
knowledg of causes, to that Sanctuary of the igorant, Occult Qualities;
since, I say, this Domestick Notion of the Chymists is so much overvalued
by them, I cannot think it unfit, they should be made sensible of their
mistake; and be admonish’d to take in more fruitful and comprehensive
Principles, if they mean to give us an account of the Phænomena of Nature;
and not confine themselves and (as far as they can) others to such narrow
Principles, as I fear will scarce inable them to give an account (I mean an
intelligible one) of the tenth part (I say not) of all the Phænomena of
Nature; but even of all such as by the Leucippian or some of the other sorts
of Principles may be plausibly enough explicated. And though I be not
unwilling to grant, that the incompetency I impute to the Chymical

Hypothesis is but the same which may be Objected against that of the four
Elements, and divers other Doctrines that have been maintain’d by Learned
men; yet since ’tis the Chymical Hypothesis only which I am now
examining, I see not why, if what I impute to it be a real inconvenience,
either it should cease to be so, or I should scruple to object it, because either
Theories are lyable thereunto, as well as the Hermetical. For I know not
why a Truth should be thought lesse a Truth for the being fit to overthrow
variety of Errors.
I am oblig’d to You (continues Carneades, a little smiling) for the
favourable Opinion You are pleas’d to express of my Equity, if there be no
design in it. But I need not be tempted by an Artifice, or invited by a
Complement, to acknowledge the great service that the Labours of
Chymists have done the Lovers of useful Learning; nor even on this
occasion shall their Arrogance hinder my Gratitude. But since we are as
well examining to the truth of their Doctrine as the merit of their industry, I
must in order to the investigation of the first, continue a reply, to talk at the
rate of the part I have assum’d; And tell you, that when I acknowledg the
usefulness of the Labours of Spagyrists to Natural Philosophy, I do it upon
the score of their experiments, not upon that of Their Speculations; for it
seems to me, that their Writings, as their Furnaces, afford as well smoke as
light; and do little lesse obscure some subjects, then they illustrate others.
And though I am unwilling to deny, that ’tis difficult for a man to be an
Accomplisht Naturalist, that is a stranger to Chymistry, yet I look upon the
common Operations and practices of Chymists, almost as I do on the
Letters of the Alphabet, without whose knowledge ’tis very hard for a man
to become a Philosopher; and yet that knowledge is very far from being
sufficient to make him One.
But (sayes Carneades, resuming a more serious Look) to consider a little
more particularly what you alledg in favour of the Chymical Doctrine of the
Tria Prima, though I shall readily acknowledge it not to be unuseful, and
that the Divisers and Embracers of it have done the Common-Wealth of
Learning some service, by helping to destroy that excessive esteem, or
rather veneration, wherewith the Doctrine of the four Elements was almost
as generally as undeservedly entertain’d; yet what has been alledg’d
concerning the usefulness of the Tria Prima, seems to me liable to no
contemptible Difficulties.

And first, as for the very way of Probation, which the more Learned and
more Sober Champions of the Chymical cause employ to evince the
Chymical Principles in Mixt Bodies, it seems to me to be farr enough from
being convincing. This grand and leading Argument, your Sennertus
Himself, who layes Great weight upon it, and tells us, that the most Learned
Philosophers employ this way of Reasoning to prove the most important
things, proposes thus: Ubicunque (sayes he) pluribus eædem affectiones &
qualitates insunt, per commune quoddam Principium insint necesse est,
sicut omnia sunt Gravia propter terram, calida propter Ignem. At Colores,
Odores, Sapores, esse φλογιϛον & similia alia, mineralibus, Metallis,
Gemmis, Lapidibus, Plantis, Animalibus insunt. Ergo per commune aliquod
principium, & subiectum, insunt. At tale principium non sunt Elementa.
Nullam enim habent ad tales qualitates producendas potentiam. Ergo alia
principia, unde fluant, inquirenda sunt.
In the Recital of this Argument, (sayes Carneades) I therefore thought fit to
retain the Language wherein the Author proposes it, that I might also retain
the propriety of some Latine Termes, to which I do not readily remember
any that fully answer in English. But as for the Argumentation it self, ’tis
built upon a precarious supposition, that seems to me neither Demonstrable
nor true; for, how does it appear, that where the same Quality is to be met
with in many Bodies, it must belong to them upon the Account of some one
Body whereof they all partake? (For that the Major of our Authors
Argument is to be Understood of the Material Ingredients of bodies, appears
by the Instances of Earth and Fire he annexes to explain it.) For to begin
with that very Example which he is pleas’d to alledge for himself; how can
he prove, that the Gravity of all Bodies proceeds from what they participate
of the Element of Earth? Since we see, that not only common Water, but the
more pure Distill’d Rain Water is heavy; and Quicksilver is much heavier
than Earth it self; though none of my Adversaries has yet prov’d, that it
contains any of that Element. And I the Rather make use of this Example of
Quicksilver, because I see not how the Assertors of the Elements will give
any better Account of it then the Chymists. For if it be demanded how it
comes to be Fluid, they will answer, that it participates much of the Nature
of Water. And indeed, according to them, Water may be the Predominant
Element in it, since we see, that several Bodies which by Distillation afford
Liquors that weigh more then their Caput Mortuum do not yet consist of

Liquor enough to be Fluid. Yet if it be demanded how Quicksilver comes to
be so heavy, then ’tis reply’d, that ’tis by reason of the Earth that abounds in
it; but since, according to them, it must consist also of air, and partly of
Fire, which they affirm to be light Elements, how comes it that it should be
so much heavier then Earth of the same bulk, though to fill up the porosities
and other Cavities it be made up into a mass or paste with Water, which it
self they allow to be a heavy Element. But to returne to our Spagyrists, we
see that Chymical Oyles and fixt Salts, though never so exquisitely purify’d
and freed from terrestrial parts, do yet remain ponderous enough. And
Experience has inform’d me, that a pound, for instance, of some of the
heaviest Woods, as Guajacum that will sink in Water, being burnt to Ashes
will yield a much less weight of them (whereof I found but a small part to
be Alcalyzate) then much lighter Vegetables: As also that the black
Charcoal of it will not sink as did the wood, but swim; which argues that the
Differing Gravity of Bodies proceeds chiefly from their particular Texture,
as is manifest in Gold, the closest and Compactest of Bodies, which is many
times heavier then we can possibly make any parcell of Earth of the same
Bulk. I will not examine, what may be argu’d touching the Gravity or
Quality Analagous thereunto, of even Celestial bodies, from the motion of
the spots about the Sun, d from the appearing equality of the suppos’d Seas
in the Moon; nor consider how little those Phæmonea would agree with
what Sennertus presumes concerning Gravity. But further to invalidate his
supposition, I shall demand, upon what Chymical Principle Fluidity
depends? And yet Fluidity is, two or three perhaps excepted, the most
diffused quality of the universe, and far more General then almost any other
of those that are to be met with in any of the Chymicall Principles, or
Aristotelian Elements; since not only the Air, but that vast expansion we
call Heaven, in comparison of which our Terrestrial Globe (supposing it
were all Solid) is but a point; and perhaps to the Sun and the fixt Stars are
fluid bodies. I demand also, from which of the Chymical Principles Motion
flowes; which yet is an affection of matter much more General then any that
can be deduc’d from any of the three Chymical Principles. I might ask the
like Question concerning Light, which is not only to be found in the
Kindl’d Sulphur of mixt Bodis, but (not to mention those sorts of rotten
Woods, and rotten Fish that shine in the Dark) in the tails of living Glow-
wormes, and in the Vast bodies of the Sun and Stars. I would gladly also
know, in which of the three Principles the Quality, we call Sound, resides as

in its proper Subject; since either Oyl falling upon Oyle, or Spirit upon
Spirit, or Salt upon Salt, in a great quantity, and from a considerable height,
will make a noise, or if you please, create a sound, and (that the objection
may reach the Aristotelians) so will also water upon water, and Earth upon
Earth. And I could name other qualities to be met within divers bodies, of
which I suppose my Adversaries will not in haste assign any Subject, upon
whose Account it must needs be, that the quality belongs to all the other
several bodies.
And, before I proceed any further, I must here invite you to compare the
supposition we are examining, with some other of the Chymical Tenents.
For, first they do in effect teach that more then one quality may belong to,
and be deduc’d from, one Principle. For, they ascribe to Salt Tasts, and the
power of Coagulation; to sulphur, as well Odours as inflamableness; And
some of them ascribe to Mercury, Colours; as all of them do effumability, as
they speak. And on the other side, it is evident that Volatility belongs in
common to all the three Principles, and to Water too. For ’tis manifest, that
Chymical Oyles are Volatile; That also divers Salts Emerging, upon the
Analysis of many Concretes, are very Volatile, is plain from the figitiveness
of Salt, of Harts-horne, flesh, &c. ascending in the Distillation of those
bodies. How easily water may be made to ascend in Vapours, there is scarce
any body that has not observ’d. And as for what they call the Mercuriall
Principle of bodies, that is so apt to be rais’d in the form of Steam, that
Paracelsus and others define it by that aptness to fly up; so that (to draw
that inference by the way) it seems not that Chymists have been accurate in
their Doctrine of qualities, and their respective Principles, since they both
derive several qualities from the same Principle, and must ascribe the same
quality to almost all their Principles and other bodies besides. And thus
much for the first thing taken for granted, without sufficient proof, by your
Sennertus: And to add that upon the Bye (continues Carneades) we may
hence learn what to judge of the way of Argumentation, which that fierce
Champion of the Aristotelians against the Chymists, Anthonius Guntherus
Billichius In Thessalo redivivo. Cap. 10. pag. 73. & 74. employes, where he pretends
to prove against Beguinus, that not only the four Elements do immediately
concur to Constitute every mixt body, and are both present in it, and
obtainable from it upon its Dissolution; but that in the Tria Prima
themselves, whereinto Chymists are wont to resolve mixt Bodies, each of

them clearly discovers it self to consist of four Elements. The Ratiocination
it self (pursues Carneades) being somewhat unusual, I did the other Day
Transcribe it, and (sayes He, pulling a Paper out of his Pocket) it is this.
Ordiamur, cum Beguino, a ligno viridi, quod si concremetur, videbis in
sudore Aquam, in fumo Aerem, in flamma & Prunis Ignem, Terram in
cineribus: Quod si Beguino placuerit ex eo colligere humidum aquosum,
cohibere humidum oleaginosum, extrahere ex cineribus salem; Ego ipsi in
unoquoque horum seorsim quatuor Elementa ad oculum demonstrabo,
eodem artificio quo in ligno viridi ea demonstravi. Humorem aquosum
admovebo Igni. Ipse Aquam Ebullire videbit, in Vapore Aerem conspiciet,
Ignem sentiet in æstu, plus minus Terræ in sedimento apparebit. Humor
porro Oleaginosus aquam humiditate & fluiditate per se, accensus vero
Ignem flamma prodit, fumo Aerem, fuligine, nidore & amurca terram.
Salem denique ipse Beguinus siccum vocat & Terrestrem, qui tamen nec
fusus Aquam, nec caustica vi ignem celare potest; ignis vero Violentia in
halitus versus nec ab Aere se alienum esse demonstrat; Idem de Lacte, de
Ovis, de semine Lini, de Garyophyllis, de Nitro, de sale Marino, denique de
Antimonio, quod fuit de Ligno viridi Judicium; eadem de illorum partibus,
quas Beguinus adducit, sententia, quæ de viridis ligni humore aquoso, quæ
de liquore ejusdem oleoso, quæ de sale fuit.
This bold Discourse (resumes Carneades, putting up again his Paper,) I
think it were not very difficult to confute, if his Arguments were as
considerable as our time will probably prove short for the remaining and
more necessary Part of my Discourse; wherefore referring You for an
Answer to what was said concerning the Dissipated Parts of a burnt piece of
green Wood, to what I told Themistius on the like occasion, I might easily
shew You, how sleightly and superficially our Guntherus talks of the
dividing the flame of Green Wood into his four Elements; When he makes
that vapour to be air, which being caught in Glasses and condens’d,
presently discovers it self to have been but an Aggregate of innumerable
very minute drops of Liquor; and When he would prove the Phlegmes being
compos’d of Fire by that Heat which is adventitious to the Liquor, and
ceases upon the absence of what produc’d it (whether that be an Agitation
proceeding from the motion of the External Fire, or the presence of a
Multitude of igneous Atomes pervading the pores of the Vessel, and nimbly
permeating the whole Body of the Water) I might, I say, urge these and

divers other Weaknesses of His Discourse. But I will rather take Notice of
what is more pertinent to the Occasion of this Digression, namely, that
Taking it for Granted, that Fluidity (with which he unwarily seems to
confound Humidity) must proceed from the Element of Water, he makes a
Chymical Oyle to Consist of that Elementary Liquor; and yet in the very
next Words proves, that it consists also of Fire, by its Inflamability; not
remembring that exquisitely pure Spirit of Wine is both more Fluid then
Water it self, and yet will Flame all away without leaving the Least
Aqueous Moisture behind it; and without such an Amurca and Soot as he
would Deduce the presence of Earth from. So that the same Liquor may
according to his Doctrine be concluded by its great Fluidity to be almost all
Water; and by its burning all away to be all disguised Fire. And by the like
way of Probation our Author would shew that the fixt salt of Wood is
compounded of the four Elements. For (sayes he) being turn’d by the
violence of the Fire into steames, it shews it self to be of kin to Air; whereas
I doubt whether he ever saw a true fixt Salt (which to become so, must have
already endur’d the violence of an Incinerating Fire) brought by the Fire
alone to ascend in the Forme of Exhalations; but I do not doubt that if he
did, and had caught those Exhalations in convenient Vessels, he would have
found them as well as the Steames of common Salt, &c. of a Saline and not
an Aereal Nature. And whereas our Authour takes it also for Granted, that
the Fusibility of Salt must be Deduc’d from Water, it is indeed so much the
Effect of heat variously agitating the Minute Parts of a Body, without regard
to Water, that Gold (which by its being the heavyest and fixtest of Bodies,
should be the most Earthy) will be brought to Fusion by a strong Fire;
which sure is more likely to drive away then increase its Aqueous
Ingredient, if it have any; and on the other side, for want of a sufficient
agitation of its minute parts, Ice is not Fluid, but Solid; though he presumes
also that the Mordicant Quality of Bodies must proceed from a fiery
ingredient; whereas, not to urge that the Light and inflamable parts, which
are the most likely to belong to the Element of Fire, must probably be
driven away by that time the violence of the Fire has reduc’d the Body to
ashes; Not to urge this, I I say, nor that Oyle of Vitriol which quenches Fire,
burnes the Tongue and flesh of those that Unwarily tast or apply it, as a
caustick doth, it is precarious to prove the Presence of Fire in fixt salts from
their Caustick power, unlesse it were first shewn, that all the Qualities
ascribed to salts must be deduc’d from those of the Elements; which, had I

Time, I could easily manifest to be no easy talk. And not to mention that our
Authour makes a Body as Homogeneous as any he can produce for
Elementary, belong both to Water and Fire, Though it be neither Fluid nor
Insipid, like Water; nor light and Volatile, like Fire; he seems to omit in this
Anatomy the Element of Earth, save That he intimates, That the salt may
pass for that; But since a few lines before, he takes Ashes for Earth, I see
not how he will avoid an Inconsistency either betwixt the Parts of his
Discourse or betwixt some of them and his Doctrine. For since There is a
manifest Difference betwixt the Saline and the insipid Parts of Ashes, I see
not how substances That Disagree in such Notable Qualities can be both
said to be Portions of an Element, whose Nature requires that it be
Homogeneous, especially in this case where an Analysis by the Fire is
suppos’d to have separated it from the admixture of other Elements, which
are confess’d by most Aristotelians to be Generally found in common
Earth, and to render it impure. And sure if when we have consider’d for
how little a Disparities sake the Peripateticks make these Symbolizing
Bodies Aire and Fire to be two Distinct Elements, we shall also consider
that the Saline part of Ashes is very strongly Tasted, and easily soluble in
Water; whereas the other part of the same Ashes is insipid and indissoluble
in the same Liquor: Not to add, that the one substance is Opacous, and the
other somewhat Diaphanous, nor that they differ in Divers other Particulars;
If we consider those things, I say, we shall hardly think that both these
Substances are Elementary Earth; And as to what is sometimes objected,
that their Saline Tast is only an Effect of Incineration and Adustion, it has
been elsewhere fully reply’d to, when propos’d by Themistius, and where it
has been prov’d against him, that however insipid Earth may perhaps by
Additaments be turn’d into Salt, yet ’tis not like it should be so by the Fire
alone: For we see that when we refine Gold and Silver, the violentest Fires
We can Employ on them give them not the least Rellish of Saltness. And I
think Philoponus has rightly observ’d, that the Ashes of some Concretes
contain very little salt if any at all; For Refiners suppose that bone-ashes are
free from it, and therefore make use of them for Tests and Cuppels, which
ought to be Destitute of Salt, lest the Violence of the Fire should bring them
to Vitrification; And having purposely and heedfully tasted a Cuppel made
of only bone-ashes and fair water, which I had caus’d to be expos’d to a
Very Violent Fire, acuated by the Blast of a large pair of Double Bellows, I

could not perceive that the force of the Fire had imparted to it the least
Saltness, or so much as made it less Insipid.
But (sayes Carneades) since neither You nor I love Repetitions, I shall not
now make any of what else was urg’d against Themistius but rather invite
You to take notice with me that when our Authour, though a Learned Man,
and one that pretends skill enough in Chymistry to reforme the whole Art,
comes to make good his confident Undertaking, to give us an occular
Demonstration of the immediate Presence of the four Elements in the
resolution of Green Wood, He is fain to say things that agree very little with
one another. For about the beginning of that passage of His lately recited to
you, he makes the sweat as he calls it of the green Wood to be Water, the
smoke Aire, the shining Matter Fire, and the Ashes Earth; whereas a few
lines after, he will in each of these, nay (as I just now noted) in one Distinct
Part of the Ashes, shew the four Elements. So that either the former
Analysis must be incompetent to prove that Number of Elements, since by it
the burnt Concrete is not reduc’d into Elementary Bodies, but into such as
are yet each of them compounded of the four Elements; or else these
Qualities from which he endeavours to deduce the presence of all the
Elements, in the fixt salt, and each of the other separated substances, will be
but a precarious way of probation: especially if you consider, that the
extracted Alcali of Wood, being for ought appears at least as similar a Body
as any that the Peripateticks can shew us, if its differing Qualities must
argue the presence of Distinct Elements, it will scarce be possible for them
by any way they know of employing the fire upon a Body, to shew that any
Body is a Portion of a true Element: And this recals to my mind, that I am
now but in an occasional excussion, which aiming only to shew that the
Peripateticks as well as the Chymists take in our present Controversie
something for granted which they ought to prove, I shall returne to my
exceptions, where I ended the first of them, and further tell you, that neither
is that the only precarious thing that I take notice of in Sennertus his
Argumentation; for when he inferrs, that because the Qualities he Mentions
as Colours, Smels, and the like, belong not to the Elements; they therefore
must to the Chymical Principles, he takes that for granted, which will not in
haste be prov’d; as I might here manifest, but that I may by and by have a
fitter opportunity to take notice of it. And thus much at present may suffice
to have Discours’d against the Supposition, that almost every Quality must

have some δεκτικον πρωτον, as they speak, some Native receptacle,
wherein as in its proper Subject of inhesion it peculiarly resides, and on
whose account that quality belongs to the other Bodies, Wherein it is to be
met with. Now this Fundamental supposition being once Destroy’d,
whatsoever is built upon it, must fall to ruine of it self.
But I consider further, that Chymists are (for ought I have found) far from
being able to explicate by any of the Tria Prima, those qualities which they
pretend to belong primarily unto it, and in mixt Bodies to Deduce from it.
Tis true indeed, that such qualities are not explicable by the four Elements;
but it will not therefore follow, that they are so by the three hermetical
Principles; and this is it that seems to have deceiv’d the Chymists, and is
indeed a very common mistake amongst most Disputants, who argue as if
there could be but two Opinions concerning the Difficulty about which they
contend; and consequently they inferr, that if their Adversaries Opinion be
Erroneous, Their’s must needs be the Truth; whereas many questions, and
especially in matters Physiological, may admit of so many Differing
Hypotheses, that ’twill be very inconsiderate and fallacious to conclude
(except where the Opinions are precisely Contradictory) the Truth of one
from the falsity of another. And in our particular case ’tis no way necessary,
that the Properties of mixt Bodies must be explicable either by the
Hermetical, or the Aristotelian Hypothesis, there being divers other and
more plausible wayes of explaining them, and especially that, which
deduces qualities from the motion, figure, and contrivance of the small parts
of Bodies; as I think might be shewn, if the attempt were as seasonable, as I
fear it would be Tedious.
I will allow then, that the Chymists do not causelessly accuse the Doctrine
of the four elements of incompetency to explain the Properties of
Compound bodies. And for this Rejection of a Vulgar Error, they ought not
to be deny’d what praise men may deserve for exploding a Doctrine whose
Imperfections are so conspicuous, that men needed but not to shut their
Eyes, to discover them. But I am mistaken, if our Hermetical Philosophers
Themselves need not, as well as the Peripateticks, have Recourse to more
Fruitfull and Comprehensive Principles then the tria Prima, to make out the
Properties of the Bodies they converse with. Not to accumulate Examples to
this purpose, (because I hope for a fitter opportunity to prosecute this
Subject) let us at present only point at Colour, that you may guess by what

they say of so obvious and familiar a Quality, how little Instruction we are
to expect from the Tria Prima in those more abstruse ones, which they with
the Aristotelians stile Occult. For about Colours, neither do they at all agree
among themselves, nor have I met with any one, of which of the three
Perswasions soever, that does intelligibly explicate Them. The Vulgar
Chymists are wont to ascribe Colours to Mercury; Paracelsus in divers
places attributes them to Salt; and Sennertus, De Cons. & dissen. cap. 11. pag. 186.
having recited their differing Opinions, Dissents from both, and referrs
Colours rather unto Sulphur. But how Colours do, nay, how they may, arise
from either of these Principles, I think you will scarce say that any has yet
intelligibly explicated. And if Mr. Boyle will allow me to shew you the
Experiments which he has collected about Colours, you will, I doubt not,
confess that bodies exhibite colours, not upon the Account of the
Predominancy of this or that Principle in them, but upon that of their
Texture, and especially the Disposition of their superficial parts, whereby
the Light rebounding thence to the Eye is so modifi’d, as by differing
Impressions variously to affect the Organs of Sight. I might here take notice
of the pleasing variety of Colours exhibited by the Triangular glass, (as ’tis
wont to be call’d) and demand, what addition or decrement of either Salt,
Sulphur, or Mercury, befalls the Body of the Glass by being Prismatically
figur’d; and yet ’tis known, that without that shape it would not affor’d
those colours as it does. But because it may be objected, that these are not
real, but apparent Colours; that I may not lose time in examing the
Distinction, I will alledge against the Chymists, a couple of examples of
Real and Permanent Colours Drawn from Metalline Bodies, and represent,
that without the addition of any extraneous body, Quicksilver may by the
Fire alone, and that in glass Vessels, be depriv’d of its silver-like Colour,
and be turn’d into a Red Body; and from this Red Body without Addition
likewise may be obtain’d a Mercury Bright and Specular as it was before;
So that I have here a lasting Colour Generated and Destroy’d (as I have
seen) at pleasure, without adding or taking away either Mercury, Salt, or
Sulphur; and if you take a clean and slender piece of harden’d steel, and
apply to it the flame of a candle at some little distance short of the point,
You shall not have held the Steel long in the flame, but You shall perceive
divers Colours, as Yellow, Red and Blew, to appear upon the Surface of the
metal, and as it were run along in chase of one another towards the point;
So that the same body, and that in one and the same part, may not only have

a new colour produc’d in it, but exhibite successively divers Colours within
a minute of an hour, or thereabouts, and any of these Colours may by
Removing the Steel from the Fire, become Permanent, and last many years.
And this Production and Variety of Colours cannot reasonably be suppos’d
to proceed from the Accession of any of the three Principles, to which of
them soever Chymists will be pleas’d to ascribe Colours; especially
considering, that if you but suddenly Refrigerate that Iron, First made Red
hot, it will be harden’d and Colourless again; and not only by the Flame of
a Candle, but by any other equivalent heat Conveniently appli’d, the like
Colours will again be made to appear and succeed one another, as at the
First. But I must not any further prosecute an Occasional Discourse, though
that were not so Difficult for me to do, as I fear it would be for the
Chymists to give a better Account of the other Qualities, by their Principles,
then they have done of Colours. And your Sennertus Sennert. de Con. seus. &
Dissens. pag. 165. 166. Himself (though an Author I much value) would I fear
have been exceedingly puzl’d to resolve, by the Tria Prima, halfe that
Catalogue of Problems, which he challenges the Vulgar Peripateticks to
explicate by their four Elements. And supposing it were true, that Salt or
Sulphur were the Principle to which this or that Quality may be peculiarly
referr’d, yet though he that teaches us this teaches us something concerning
That quality, yet he Teaches us but something. For indeed he does not Teach
us That which can in any Tollerable measure satisfie an inquisitive Searcher
after Truth. For what is it to me to know, that such a quality resides in such
a Principle or Element, whilst I remain altogether ignorant of the Cause of
that quality, and the manner of its production and Operation? How little do I
know more then any Ordinary Man of Gravity, if I know but that the
Heaviness of mixt bodies proceeds from that of the Earth they are compos’d
of, if I know not the reason why the Earth is Heavy? And how little does the
Chymist teach the Philosopher of the Nature of Purgatition, if he only tells
him that the Purgative Vertue of Medicines resides in their Salt? For,
besides that this must not be conceded without Limitation, since the purging
parts of many Vegetables Extracted by the Water wherein they are infus’d,
are at most but such compounded Salts, (I mean mingl’d with Oyle, and
Spirit, and Earth, as Tartar and divers other Subjects of the Vegetable
Kingdom afford;) And since too that Quicksilver precipitated either with
Gold, or without Addition, into a powder, is wont to be strongly enough
Cathartical, though the Chymists have not yet prov’d, that either Gold or

Mercury have any Salt at all, much less any that is Purgative; Besides this, I
say, how little is it to me, to know That ’tis the Salt of the Rhubarb (for
Instance) that purges, if I find That it does not purge as Salt; since scarce
any Elementary Salt is in small quantity cathartical. And if I know not how
Purgation in general is effected in a Humane Body? In a word, as ’tis one
thing to know a mans Lodging, and another, to be acquainted with him; so it
may be one thing to know the subject wherein a Quality principally resides,
and another thing to have a right notion and knowledg of the quality its self.
Now that which I take to be the reason of this Chymical Deficiency, is the
same upon whose account I think the Aristotelian and divers other Theories
incompetent to explicate the Origen of Qualities. For I am apt to think, that
men will never be able to explain the Phænomena of Nature, while they
endeavour to deduce them only from the Presence and Proportion of such or
such material Ingredients, and consider such ingredients or Elements as
Bodies in a state of rest; whereas indeed the greatest part of the affections of
matter, and consequently of the Phænomena of nature, seems to depend
upon the motion and the continuance of the small parts of Bodies. For ’tis
by motion that one part of matter acts upon another; and ’tis, for the most
part, the texture of the Body upon which the moving parts strike, that
modifies to motion or Impression, and concurrs with it to the production of
those Effects which make up the chief part of the Naturalists Theme.
But (sayes Eleutherius) me thinks for all this, you have left some part of
what I alledg’d in behalf of the three principles, unanswer’d. For all that
you have said will not keep this from being a useful Discovery, that since in
the Salt of one Concrete, in the Sulphur of another and the Mercury of a
third, the Medicinal vertue of it resides, that Principle ought to be separated
from the rest, and there the desired faculty must be sought for.
I never denyed (Replyes Carneades) that the Notion of the Tria Prima may
be of some use, but (continues he laughing) by what you now alledg for it,
it will but appear That it is useful to Apothecaries, rather than to
Philosophers, The being able to make things Operative being sufficient to
those, whereas the Knowledge of Causes is the Thing looked after by
These. And let me Tell You, Eleutherius, even this it self will need to be
entertained with some caution.

For first, it will not presently follow, That if the Purgative or other vertue of
a simple may be easily extracted by Water or Spirit of Wine, it Resides in
the Salt or Sulphur of the Concrete; Since unlesse the Body have before
been resolved by the Fire, or some Other Powerful Agent, it will, for the
most part, afford in the Liquors I have named, rather the finer compounded
parts of it self, Than the Elementary ones. As I noted before, That Water
will dissolve not only pure Salts, but Crystals of Tartar, Gumme Arabick,
Myrr’h, and Other Compound Bodies. As also Spirit of Wine will Dissolve
not only the pure Sulphur of Concretes, but likewise the whole Substance of
divers Resinous Bodies, as Benzoin, the Gummous parts of Jallap, Gumme
Lacca, and Other bodies that are counted perfectly Mixt. And we see that
the Extracts made either with Water or Spirit of Wine are not of a simple
and Elementary Nature, but Masses consisting of the looser Corpuscles, and
finer parts of the Concretes whence they are Drawn; since by Distillation
they may be Divided into more Elementary substances.
Next, we may consider That even when there intervenes a Chymical
resolution by he Fire, ’tis seldom in the Saline or Sulphureous principle, as
such, that the desir’d Faculty of the Concrete Resides; But, as that Titular
Salt or Sulphur is yet a mixt body, though the Saline or Sulphureous Nature
be predominant in it. For, if in Chymical Resolutions the separated
Substances were pure and simple Bodies, and of a perfect Elementary
Nature; no one would be indued with more Specifick Vertues, than another;
and their qualities would Differ as Little as do those of Water. And let me
add this upon the bye, That even Eminent Chymists have suffer’d
themselves to be reprehended by me for their over great Diligence in
purifying some of the things they obtain by Fire from mixt Bodies. For
though such compleatly purifyed Ingredients of Bodies might perhaps be
more satisfactory to our Understanding; yet others are often more useful to
our Lives, the efficacy of such Chymical Productions depending most upon
what they retain of the Bodies whence they are separated, or gain by the
new associations of the Dissipated among themselves; whereas if they were
meerly Elementary, their uses would be comparatively very small; and the
vertues of Sulphurs, Salts, or Other such Substances of one denomination,
would be the very same.
And by the Way (Eleutherius) I am inclin’d upon this ground to Think, That
the artificial resolution of compound bodies by Fire does not so much

enrich mankind, as it divides them into their supposed Principles; as upon
the score of its making new compounds by now combinations of the
dissipated parts of the resolv’d Body. For by this means the Number of mixt
Bodies is considerably increased. And many of those new productions are
indow’d with useful qualities, divers of which they owe not to the body
from which they were obtein’d, but to Their newly Acquired Texture.
But thirdly, that which is principally to be Noted is this, that as there are
divers Concretes whose Faculties reside in some one or other of those
differing Substances that Chymists call their Sulphurs, Salts, and Mercuries,
and consequently may be best obtain’d, by analyzing the Concrete whereby
the desired Principles may be had sever’d or freed from the rest; So there
are other wherein the noblest properties lodge not in the Salt, or Sulphur, or
Mercury, but depend immediately upon the form (or if you will) result from
the determinate structure of the Whole Concrete; and consequently they that
go about to extract the Vertues of such bodies, by exposing them to the
Violence of the Fire, do exceedingly mistake, and take the way to Destroy
what they would obtain.
I remmember that Helmont Helmont Pharm. & Dispens. Nov. p. 458. himself
somewhere confesses, That as the Fire betters some things and improves
their Vertues, so it spoyles others and makes them degenerate. And
elsewhere he judiciously affirmes, that there may be sometimes greater
vertue in a simple, such as Nature has made it, than in any thing that can by
the fire be separated from it. And lest you should doubt whether he means
by the vertues of things those that are Medical; he has in one place this
ingenuous confession; Credo (sayes he) simplicia in sua simplicitate esse
sufficientia pro sanatione omnium morborum. Nag. Barthias, Vide Jer. ad
Begu. Lib. 1. Cap. 17. even in a Comment upon Beguinus, scruples not to make
this acknowledgment; Valde absurdum est (sayes he) ex omnibus rebus
extracta facere, salia, quintas essentias; præsertim ex substantiis per se
plane vel subtilibus vel homogeneis, quales sunt uniones, Corallia, Moscus,
Ambra, &c. Consonantly whereunto he also tells Us (and Vouches the
famous Platerus, for having candidly given the same Advertisement to his
Auditors,) that some things have greater vertues, and better suited to our
humane nature, when unprepar’d, than when they have past the Chymists
Fire; as we see, sayes my Author, in Pepper; of which some grains

swallowed perform more towards the relief of a Distempered stomack, than
a great quantity of the Oyle of the same spice.
It has been (pursues Carneades) by our Friend here present observ’d
concerning Salt-petre, that none of the substances into which the Fire is
wont to divide it, retaines either the Tast, the cooling vertue, or some other
of the properties of the Concrete; and that each of those Substances acquires
new qualities, not to be found in the Salt-Petre it self. The shining property
of the tayls of gloworms does survive but so short a time the little animal
made conspicuous by it, that inquisitive men have not scrupled publickly to
deride Baptista Porta and others; who deluded perhaps with some
Chymical surmises have ventur’d to prescribe the distillation of a Water
from the tayles of Glowormes, as a sure way to obtain a liquor shining in
the Dark. To which I shall now add no other example than that afforded us
by Amber; which, whilst it remains an intire body, is endow’d with an
Electrical faculty of drawing to it self fethers, strawes, and such like
Bodies; which I never could observe either in its Salt, its Spirit, its Oyle, or
in the Body I remember I once made by the reunion of its divided Elements;
none of these having such a Texture as the intire Concrete. And however
Chymists boldly deduce such and such properties from this or that
proportion of their component Principles; yet in Concretes that abound with
this or that Ingredient, ’tis not alwayes so much by vertue of its presence,
nor its plenty, that the Concrete is qualify’d to perform such and such
Effects; as upon the account of the particular texture of that and the other
Ingredients, associated after a determinate Manner into one Concrete
(though possibly such a proportion of that ingredient may be more
convenient than an other for the constituting of such a body.) Thus in a
clock the hand is mov’d upon the dyal, the bell is struck, and the other
actions belonging to the engine are perform’d, not because the Wheeles are
of brass or iron, or part of one metal and part of another, or because the
weights are of Lead, but by Vertue of the size, shape, bigness, and co-
aptation of the several parts; which would performe the same things though
the wheels were of Silver, or Lead, or Wood, and the Weights of Stone or
Clay; provided the Fabrick or Contrivance of the engine were the same:
though it be not to be deny’d, that Brasse and Steel are more convenient
materials to make clock-wheels of than Lead, or Wood. And to let you see,
Eleutherius, that ’tis sometimes at least, upon the Texture of the small parts

of a body, and not alwaies upon the presence, or recesse, or increase, or
Decrement of any one of its Principle, that it may lose some(142) such
Qualities, and acquire some such others as are thought very strongly
inherent to the bodies they Reside in. I will add to what may from my past
discourse be refer’d to this purpose, this Notable Example, from my Own
experience; That Lead may without any additament, and only by various
applications of the Fire, lose its colour, and acquire sometimes a gray,
sometimes a yellowish, sometimes a red, sometimes an amethihstine colour;
and after having past through these, and perhaps divers others, again
recover its leaden colour, and be made a bright body. That also this Lead,
which is so flexible a metal, may be made as brittle as Glasse, and presently
be brought to be again flexible and Malleable as before. And besides, that
the same lead, which I find by Microscopes to be one of the most opacous
bodies in the World, may be reduced to a fine transparent glasse; whence
yet it may returne to an opacous Nature again; and all this, as I said, without
the addition of any extraneous body, and meerly by the manner and Method
of exposing it to the Fire.
But (sayes Carneades) after having already put you to so prolix a trouble, it
is time for me to relieve you with a promise of putting speedily a period to
it; And to make good that promise, I shall from all that I have hitherto
discoursed with you, deduce but this one proposition by way of Corollary.
[That it may as yet be doubted, whether or no there be any determinate
Number of Elements; Or, if you please, whether or no all compound bodies,
do consist of the same number of Elementary ingredients or material
Principles.]
This being but an inference from the foregoing Discourse, it will not be
requisite to insist at large on the proofs of it; But only to point at the chief
of Them, and Referr You for Particulars to what has been already Delivered.
In the First place then, from what has been so largely discours’d, it may
appear, that the Experiments wont to be brought, whether by the common
Peripateticks, or by the vulgar Chymists, to demonstrate that all mixt bodies
are made up precisely either of the four Elements, or the three Hypostatical
Principles, do not evince what they are alledg’d to prove. And as for the
other common arguments, pretended to be drawn from Reason in favour of
Aristotelian Hypothesis (for the Chymists are wont to rely almost altogether

upon Experiments) they are Commonly grounded upon such unreasonable
or precarious Suppositions, that ’tis altogether as easie and as just for any
man to reject them, as for those that take them for granted to assert them,
being indeed all of them as indemonstrable as the conclusion to be inferr’d
from them; and some of them so manifestly weak and prooflesse; that he
must be a very courteous adversary, that can be willing to grant them; and
as unskilful a one, that can be compelled to do so.
In the next place, it may be considered, if what those Patriarchs of the
Spagyrists, Paracelsus and Helmont, do on divers occasions positively
deliver, be true; namely that the Alkahest does Resolve all mixt Bodies into
other Principles than the fire, it must be decided which of the two
resolutions (that made by the Alkahest, or that made by the fire) shall
determine the number of the Elements, before we can be certain how many
there are.
And in the mean time, we may take notice in the last place, that as the
distinct substances whereinto the Alkahest divides bodies, are affirm’d to be
differing in nature from those whereunto they are wont to be reduc’d by
fire, and to be obtain’d from some bodies more in Number than from some
others; since he tells us, Novi saxum & lapides omnes in merum salem suo saxo aut lapidi
& æquiponderantem reducere absque omni prorsus sulphure aut Mercurio. Helmont. pag. 409.
he could totally reduce all sorts of Stones into Salt only, whereas of a coal
he had two distinct Liquors. So, although we should acquiesce in that
resolution which is made by fire, we find not that all mixt bodies are
thereby divided into the same number of Elements and Principles; some
Concretes affordding more of them than others do; Nay and sometimes this
or that Body affording a greater number of Differing substances by one way
of management, than the same yields by another. And they that out of Gold,
or Mercury, or Muscovy-glasse, will draw me as many distinct substances
as I can separate from Vitriol, or from the juice of Grapes variously orderd,
may teach me that which I shall very Thankfully learn. Nor does it appear
more congruous to that variety that so much conduceth to the perfection of
the Universe, that all elemented bodies be compounded of the same number
of Elements, then it would be for a language, that all its words should
consist of the same number of Letters.

THE

SCEPTICAL CHYMIST

OR,

A Paradoxical Appendix to the
Foregoing Treatise.

The Sixth Part.

H Ere Carneades Having Dispach’t what he Thought Requisite to oppose
against what the Chymists are wont to alledge for Proof of their three
Principles, Paus’d awhile, and look’d about him, to discover whether it
were Time for him and his Friend to Rejoyne the Rest of the Company. But
Eleutherius perceiving nothing yet to forbid Them to Prosecute their
Discourse a little further, said to his Friend, (who had likewise taken Notice
of the same thing) I halfe expected, Carneades, that after you had so freely
declar’d Your doubting, whether there be any Determinate Number of
Elements, You would have proceeded to question whether there be any
Elements at all. And I confess it will be a Trouble to me if You defeat me of
my Expectation; especially since you see the leasure we have allow’d us
may probably suffice to examine that Paradox; because you have so largly
Deduc’d already many Things pertinent to it, that you need but intimate
how you would have them Apply’d, and what you would inferr from them.
Carneades having in Vain represented that their leasure could be but very
short, that he had already prated very long, that he was unprepared to
maintain so great and so invidious a Paradox, was at length prevail’d with
to tell his Friend; Since, Eleutherius, you will have me Discourse Ex
Tempore of the Paradox you mention, I am content, (though more perhaps
to express my Obedience, then my Opinion) to tell you that (supposing the
Truth of Helmonts and Paracelsus’s Alkahestical Experiments, if I may so
call them) though it may seem extravagant, yet it is not absurd to doubt,
whether, for ought has been prov’d, there be a necessity to admit any
Elements, or Hypostatical Principles, at all.
And, as formerly, so now, to avoid the needless trouble of Disputing
severally with the Aristotelians and the Chymists, I will address my self to
oppose them I have last nam’d, Because their Doctrine about the Elements
is more applauded by the Moderns, as pretending highly to be grounded
upon Experience. And, to deal not only fairly but favourably with them, I

will allow them to take in Earth and Water to their other Principles. Which I
consent to, the rather that my Discourse may the better reach the Tenents of
the Peripateticks; who cannot plead for any so probably as for those two
Elements; that of fire above the Air being Generally by Judicious Men
exploded as an Imaginary thing; And the Air not concurring to compose
Mixt Bodies as one of their Elements, but only lodging in their pores, or
Rather replenishing, by reason of its Weight and Fluidity, all those Cavities
of bodies here below, whether compounded or not, that are big enough to
admit it, and are not fill’d up with any grosser substance.
And, to prevent mistakes, I must advertize You, that I now mean by
Elements, as those Chymists that speak plainest do by their Principles,
certain Primitive and Simple, or perfectly unmingled bodies; which not
being made of any other bodies, or of one another, are the Ingredients of
which all those call’d perfectly mixt Bodies are immediately compounded,
and into which they are ultimately resolved: now whether there be any one
such body to be constantly met with in all, and each, of those that are said
to be Elemented bodies, is the thing I now question.
By this State of the controversie you will, I suppose, Guess, that I need not
be so absur’d as to deny that there are such bodies as Earth, and Water, and
Quicksilver, and Sulphur: But I look upon Earth and Water, as component
parts of the Universe, or rather of the Terrestrial Globe, not of all mixt
bodies. And though I will not peremptorily deny that there may sometimes
either a running Mercury, or a Combustible Substance be obtain’d from a
Mineral, or even a Metal; yet I need not Concede either of them to be an
Element in the sence above declar’d; as I shall have occasion to shew you
by and by.
To give you then a brief account of the grounds I intend to proceed upon, I
must tell you, that in matters of Philosophy, this seems to me a sufficient
reason to doubt of a known and important proposition, that the Truth of it is
not yet by any competent proof made to appear. And congruously herunto,
if I shew that the grounds upon which men are perswaded that there are
Elements are unable to satisfie a considering man, I suppose my doubts will
appear rational.

Now the Considerations that induce men to think that there are Elements,
may be conveniently enough referr’d to two heads. Namely, the one, that it
is necessary that Nature make use of Elements to constitute the bodies that
are reputed Mixt. And the other, That the Resolution of such bodies
manifests that nature had compounded them of Elementary ones.
In reference to the former of these Considerations, there are two or three
things that I have to Represent.
And I will begin with reminding you of the Experiments I not long since
related to you concerning the growth of pompions, mint, and other
vegetables, out of fair water. For by those experiments its seems evident,
that Water may be Transmuted into all the other Elements; from whence it
may be inferr’d, both, That ’tis not every Thing Chymists will call Salt,
Sulphur, or Spirit, that needs alwayes be a Primordiate and Ingenerable
body. And that Nature may contex a Plant (though that be a perfectly mixt
Concrete) without having all the Elements previously presented to her to
compound it of. And, if you will allow the relation I mention’d out of
Mounsieur De Rochas to be True; then may not only plants, but Animals
and Minerals too, be produced out of Water, And however there is little
doubt to be made, but that the plants my tryals afforded me as they were
like in so many other respects to the rest of the plants of the same
Denomination; so they would, in case I had reduc’d them to putrefaction,
have likewise produc’d Wormes or other insects, as well as the resembling
Vegetables are wont to do; so that Water may, by Various Seminal
Principles, be successively Transmuted into both plants and Animals. And if
we consider that not only Men, but even sucking Children are, but too
often, Tormented with Solid Stones, but that divers sorts of Beasts
themselves, (whatever Helmont against Experience think to the contrary)
may be Troubled with great and Heavy stones in their Kidneys and
Bladders, though they Feed but upon Grass and other Vegetables, that are
perhaps but Disguised Water, it will not seem improbable that even some
Concretes of a mineral Nature, may Likewise be form’d of Water.
We may further Take notice, that as a Plant may be nourisht, and
consequently may Consist of Common water; so may both plants and
Animals, (perhaps even from their Seminal Rudiments) consist of
compound Bodies, without having any thing meerly Elementary brought

them by nature to be compounded by them: This is evident in divers men,
who whilst they were Infants were fed only with Milk, afterwards Live
altogether upon Flesh, Fish, wine, and other perfectly mixt Bodies. It may
be seen also in sheep, who on some of our English Downs or Plains, grow
very fat by feeding upon the grasse, without scarce drinking at all. And yet
more manifestly in the magots that breed and grow up to their full bignesse
within the pulps of Apples, Pears, or the like Fruit. We see also, that Dungs
that abound with a mixt Salt give a much more speedy increment to corn
and other Vegetables than Water alone would do: And it hath been assur’d
me, by a man experienc’d in such matters, that sometimes when to bring up
roots very early, the Mould they were planted in was made over-rich, the
very substance of the Plant has tasted of the Dung. And let us also consider
a Graft of one kind of Fruit upon the upper bough of a Tree of another kind.
As for instance, the Ciens of a Pear upon a White-thorne; for there the
ascending Liquor is already alter’d, either by the root, or in its ascent by the
bark, or both wayes, and becomes a new mixt body: as may appear by the
differing qualities to be met with in the saps of several trees; as particularly,
the medicinal vertue of the Birch-Water (which I have sometimes drunk
upon Helmonts great and not undeserved commendation) Now the graft,
being fasten’d to the stock must necessarily nourish its self, and produce its
Fruit, only out of this compound Juice prepared for it by the Stock, being
unable to come at any other aliment. And if we consider, how much of the
Vegetable he feeds upon may (as we noted above) remain in an Animal; we
may easily suppose, That the blood of that Animal who Feeds upon this,
though it be a Well constituted Liquor, and have all the differing Corpuscles
that make it up kept in order by one præsiding form, may be a strangely
Decompounded Body, many of its parts being themselves decompounded.
So little is it Necessary that even in the mixtures which nature her self
makes in Animal and Vegetable Bodies, she should have pure Elements at
hand to make her compositions of.
Having said thus much touching the constitution of Plants and Animals, I
might perhaps be able to say as much touching that of Minerals, and even
Metalls, if it were as easy for us to make experiment in Order to the
production of these, as of those. But the growth or increment of Minerals
being usually a work of excessively long time, and for the most part

perform’d in the bowels of the Earth, where we cannot see it, I must instead
of Experiments make use, on this occasion, of Observations.
That stones were not all made at once, but that are some of them now
adayes generated, may (though it be deny’d by some) be fully prov’d by
several examples, of which I shall now scarce alledg any other, then that
famous place in France known by the name of Les Caves Gentieres, where
the Water falling from the upper Parts of the cave to the ground does
presently there condense into little stones, of such figures as the drops,
falling either severally or upon one another, and coagulating presently into
stone, chance to exhibit. Of these stones some Ingenuous Friends of ours,
that went a while since to visit that place, did me the favour to present me
with some that they brought thence. And I remember that both that sober
Relator of his Voyages, Van Linschoten, and another good Author, inform us
that in the Diamond Mines (as they call them) in the East-Indies, when
having dig’d the Earth, though to no great depth, they find Diamonds and
take them quite away; Yet in a very few years they find in the same place
new Diamonds produc’d there since. From both which Relations, especially
the first, it seems probable that Nature does not alwayes stay for divers
Elementary Bodies, when she is to produce stones. And as for Metals
themselves, Authors of good note assure us, that even they were not in the
beginning produc’d at once altogether, but have been observ’d to grow; so
that what was not a Mineral or Metal before became one afterwards. Of this
it were easie to alledg many testimonies of professed Chymists. But that
they may have the greater authority, I shall rather present you with a few
borrowed from more unsuspected writers. Sulphuris Mineram (as the
inquisitive P. Fallopius notes) quæ nutrix est caloris subterranei(158) fabri
seu Archæi fontium & mineralium, Infra terram citissime renasci testantur
Historiæ Metallicæ. Sunt enim loca e quibus si hoc anno sulphur effossum
fuerit; intermissa fossione per quadriennium redeunt fossores & omnia
sulphure, ut autea, rursus inveniunt plena. Pliny Relates, In Italiæ Insula
Ilva, gigni ferri metallum. Strabo multo expressius; effossum ibi metallum
semper regenerari. Nam si effossio spatio centum annorum intermittebatur,
& iterum illuc revertebantur, fossores reperisse maximam copiam ferri
regeneratam. Which history not only is countenanced by Fallopius, from
the Incom which the Iron of that Island yielded the Duke of Florence in his
time; but is mention’d more expressely to our purpose, by the Learned

Cesalpinus. Vena (sayes he) ferri copiosissima est in Italia; ob eam
nobilitata Ilva Tirrheni maris Insula incredibili copia, etiam nostris
temporibus eam gignens: Nam terra quæ eruitur dum vena effoditur tota,
procedente tempore in venam convertitur. Which last clause is therefore
very notable, because from thence we may deduce, that earth, by a
Metalline plastick principle latent in it, may be in processe of time chang’d
into a metal. And even Agricola In Lygiis, ad Sagam opidum; in pratis eruitur ferrum,
fossis ad altitudinem bipedaneam actis. Id decennio renatum denuo foditur non aliter ac Ilvæ
ferrum. himself, though the Chymists complain of him as their adversary,
acknowledges thus much and more; by telling us that at a Town called Saga
in Germany, they dig up Iron in the Fields, by sinking ditches two foot
deep; And adding, that within the space of ten years the Ditches are digged
again for Iron since produced, As the same Metal is wont to be obtain’d in
Elva. Also concerning Lead, not to mention what even Galen notes, that it
will increase both in bulk and Weight if it be long kept in Vaults or Sellars,
where the Air is gross and thick, as he collects from the smelling of those
pieces of Lead that were imploy’d to fasten together the parts of old
Statues. Not to mention this, I say, Boccacius Certaldus, as I find him
Quoted by a Diligent Writer, has this Passage touching the Growth of Lead.
Fessularum mons (sayes he) in Hetruria, Florentiæ civitati imminens,
lapides plumbarios habet; qui si excidantur, brevi temporis spatio, novis
incrementis instaurantur; ut (annexes my Author) tradit Boccacius
Certaldus, qui id compotissimum esse scribit. Nihil hoc novi est; sed de
eadem Plinius, lib. 34. Hist. Natur. cap. 17. dudum prodidit, Inquiens,
mirum in his solis plumbi metallis, quod derelicta fertilius reviviscunt. In
plumbariis secundo Lapide ab Amberga dictis ad Asylum recrementa
congesta in cumulos, exposita solibus pluviisque paucis annis, redunt suum
metallum cum fenore. I might Add to these, continues Carneades, many
things that I have met with concerning the Generation of Gold and Silver.
But, for fear of wanting time, I shall mention but two or three Narratives.
The First you may find Recorded by Gerhardus the Physick Professor, in
these Words. In valle (sayes he) Joachimaca argentum gramini modo &
more e Lapidibus mineræ velut e radice excrevisse digiti Longitudine, testis
est Dr. Schreterus, qui ejusmodi venas aspectu jucundas & admirabiles
Domi sua aliis sæpe monstravit & Donavit. Item Aqua cærulea Inventa est
Annebergæ, ubi argentum erat adhuc in primo ente, quæ coagulata redacta
est in calcem fixi & boni argenti.

The other two Relations I have not met with in Latine Authours, and yet
they are both very memorable in themselves, and as pertinent to our present
purpose.
The first I meet with in the Commentary of Johannes Valehius upon the
Kleine Baur, In which that Industrious Chymist Relates, with many
circumstances, that at a Mine-Town (If I may so English the German
Bergstat) eight miles or Leagues distant from Strasburg call’d Mariakirch, a
Workman came to the Overseer, and desired employment; but he telling
him that there was not any of the best sort at present for him, added that till
he could be preferr’d to some such, he might in the mean time, to avoid
idleness, work in a Grove or Mine-pit thereabouts, which at that time was
little esteem’d. This Workman after some weeks Labour, had by a Crack
appearing in the Stone upon a Stroak given near the wall, an Invitation
Given him to Work his Way through, which as soon as he had done, his
Eyes were saluted by a mighty stone or Lump which stood in the middle of
the Cleft (that had a hollow place behind it) upright, and in shew like an
armed-man; but consisted of pure fine Silver having no Vein or Ore by it, or
any other Additament, but stood there free, having only underfoot
something like a burnt matter; and yet this one Lump held in Weight above
a 1000 marks, which, according to the Dutch, Account makes 500 pound
weight of fine silver. From which and other Circumstances my Author
gathers; That by the warmth of the place, the Noble Metalline Spirits,
(Sulphureous and Mercurial) were carri’d from the neighbouring Galleries
or Vaults, through other smaller Cracks and Clefts, into that Cavity, and
there collected as in a close Chamber or Cellar; whereinto when they were
gotten, they did in process of time settle into the forementioned precious
mass of Metal.
The other Germane Relation is of That great Traveller and Laborious
Chymist Johannes (not Georgus) Agricola; who in his notes upon what
Poppius has written of Antimony, Relates, that when he was among the
Hungarian Mines in the deep Groves, he observ’d that there would often
arise in them a warm Steam (not of that malignant sort which the Germains
call Shwadt, which (sayes he) is a meer poyson, and often suffocates the
Diggers, which fasten’d it self to the Walls; and that coming again to review
it after a couple of dayes, he discern’d that it was all very fast, and
glistering; whereupon having collected it and Distill’d it per Retortam, he

obtain’d from it a fine Spirit, adding, that the Mine-Men inform’d him, that
this Steam or Damp of the English Mine (retaining the dutch Term) would
at last have become a Metal, as Gold or Silver.
I referr (sayes Carneades) to another Occasion, the Use that may be made
of these Narratives towards the explicating the Nature of Metalls; and that
of Fixtness, Malleableness, and some other Qualities conspicuous in them.
And in the mean time, this I may at present deduce from these
Observations, That ’tis not very probable, that, whensoever a Mineral, or
even a Metall, is to be Generated in the Bowels of the Earth, Nature needs
to have at hand both Salt, and Sulphur, and Mercury to Compound it of; for,
not to urge that the two last Relations seem less to favour the Chymists than
Aristotle, who would have Metals Generated of certain Halitus or steams,
the foremention’d Observations together, make it seem more Likely that the
mineral Earths or those Metalline steams (wherewith probably such Earths
are plentifully imbu’d) do contain in them some seminal Rudiment, or some
thing Equivalent thereunto; by whose plastick power the rest of the matter,
though perhaps Terrestrial and heavy, is in Tract of time fashion’d into this
or That metalline Ore; almost as I formerly noted, that fair water was by the
seminal Principle of Mint, Pompions, and other Vegetables, contriv’d into
Bodies answerable to such Seeds. And that such Alterations of Terrestrial
matter are not impossible, seems evident from that notable Practice of the
Boylers of Salt-Petre, who unanimously observe, as well here in England as
in other Countries; That if an Earth pregnant with Nitre be depriv’d, by the
affusion of water, of all its true and dissoluble Salt, yet the Earth will after
some years yield them Salt-Petre again; For which reason some of the
eminent and skillfullest of them keep it in heaps as a perpetual Mine of Salt
Petre; whence it may appear, that the Seminal Principle of Nitre latent in the
Earth does by degrees Transforme the neighbouring matter into a Nitrous
Body; for though I deny that some Volatile Nitre may by such Earths be
attracted (as they speak) out of the Air, yet that the innermost parts of such
great heaps that lye so remote from the Air should borrow from it all the
Nitre they abound with, is not probable, for other reasons besides the
remoteness of the Air, though I have not the Leasure to mention them.
And I remember, that a person of Great Credit, and well acquainted with the
wayes of making Vitriol, affirm’d to me, that he had observ’d, that a kind of
mineral which abounds in that Salt, being kept within Doors and not

expos’d (as is usual) to the free Air and Rains, did of it self in no very long
time turn into Vitriol, not only in the outward or superficial, but even in the
internal and most Central parts.
And I also remember, that I met with a certain kind of Merkasite that lay
together in great Quantities under ground, which did, even in my chamber,
in so few hours begin of it self to turne into Vitriol, that we need not distrust
the newly recited narrative. But to return to what I was saying of Nitre; as
Nature made this Salt-Petre out of the once almost and inodorous Earth it
was bred in, and did not find a very stinking and corrosive Acid Liquor, and
a sharp Alcalyzate Salt to compound it of, though these be the Bodies into
which the Fire dissolves it; so it were not necessary that Nature should
make up all Metals and other Minerals of Pre-existent Salt, and Sulphur,
and Mercury, though such Bodies might by Fire be obtained from it. Which
one consideration duly weigh’d is very considerable in the present
controversy: And to this agree well the Relations of our two German
Chymists; for besides that it cannot be convincingly prov’d, it is not so
much as likely that so languid and moderate a heat as that within the Mines,
should carry up to so great a heat, though in the forme of fumes, Salt,
Sulphur and Mercury; since we find in our Distillations, that it requires a
considerable Degree of Fire to raise so much as to the height of one foot not
only Salt, but even Mercury it self, in close Vessels. And if it be objected,
that it seems by the stink that is sometimes observ’d when Lightening falls
down here below, that sulphureous steams may ascend very high without
any extraordinary Degree of heat; It may be answer’d, among other things,
that the Sulphur of Silver is by Chymists said to be a fixt Sulphur, though
not altogether so well Digested as that of Gold.
But, proceeds Carneades, If it had not been to afford You some hints
concerning the Origine of Metals, I need not have deduc’d any thing from
these Observations; It not being necessary to the Validity of my Argument
that my Deductions from them should be irrefragable, because my
Adversaries the Aristotelians and Vulgar Chymists do not, I presume, know
any better then I, a priori, of what ingredients Nature compounds Metals
and Minerals. For their Argument to prove that those Bodies are made up of
such Principles, is drawn a posteriori; I mean from this, that upon the
Analysis of Mineral bodies they are resolv’d into those differing substances.
That we may therefore examine this Argument, Let us proceed to consider

what can be alledg’d in behalf of the Elements from the Resolutions of
Bodies by the fire; which you remember was the second Tophick whence I
told you the Arguments of my Adversaries were desum’d.
And that I may first dispatch what I have to say concerning Minerals, I will
begin the remaining part of my discourse with considering how the fire
divides them.
And first, I have partly noted above, that though Chymists pretend from
some to draw salt, from others running Mercury, and from others a Sulphur;
Yet they have not hitherto taught us by any way in us among them to
separate any one principle, whether Salt, Sulphur, or Mercury, from all sorts
of Minerals without exception. And thence I may be allow’d to conclude
that there is not any of the Elements that is an Ingredient of all Bodies,
since there are some of which it is not so.
In the next place, supposing that either Sulphur or Mercury were obtainable
from all sorts of Minerals. Yet still this Sulphur or Mercury would be but a
compounded, not an Elementary body, as I told you already on another
occasion. And certainly he that takes notice of the wonderful Operations of
Quicksilver, whether it be common, or drawn from Mineral Bodies, can
scarce be so inconsiderate as to think it of the very same nature with that
immature and fugitive substance which in Vegetables and Animals
Chymists have been pleas’d to call their Mercury. So that when Mercury is
got by the help of the fire out of a metal or other Mineral Body, if we will
not suppose that it was not pre-existent in it, but produc’d by the action of
the fire upon the Concrete, we may at least suppose this Quicksilver to have
been a perfect Body of its own kind (though perhaps lesse heterogeneous
then more secundary mixts) which happen’d to be mingl’d per minima, and
coagulated with the other substances, whereof the Metal or Mineral
consisted. As may be exemplyfied partly by Native Vermillion wherein the
Quicksilver and Sulphur being exquisitely blended both with one another,
and that other course Mineral stuff (what ever it be) that harbours them,
make up a red body differing enough from both; and yet from which part of
the Quicksilver, and of the Sulphur, may be easily enough obtain’d; Partly
by those Mines wherein nature has so curiously incorporated Silver with
Lead, that ’tis extreamly difficult, and yet possible, to separate the former
out of the Latter. And partly too by native Vitriol, wherein the Metalline

Corpuscles are by skill and industry separable from the saline ones, though
they be so con-coagulated with them, that the whole Concrete is reckon’d
among Salts.
And here I further observe, that I never could see any Earth or Water,
properly so call’d, separated from either Gold or Silver (to name now no
other Metalline Bodies) and therefore to retort the argument upon my
Adversaries, I may conclude, that since there are some bodies in which, for
ought appears, there is neither Earth nor Water. I may be allow’d to
conclude that neither of those two is an Universal Ingredient of all those
Bodies that are counted perfectly mixt, which I desire you would remember
against Anon.
It may indeed be objected, that the reason why from Gold or Silver we
cannot separate any moisture, is, because that when it is melted out of the
Oare, the vehement Fire requisite to its Fusion forc’d away all the aqueous
and fugitive moisture; and the like fire may do from the materials of Glass.
To which I shall Answer, that I Remember I read not long since in the
Learned Josephus Acosta, Acosta Natural and Moral history of the Indies, L. 3. c. 5, p.
212. who relates it upon his own observation; that in America, (where he
long lived) there is a kind of Silver which the Indians call Papas, and
sometimes (sayes he) they find pieces very fine and pure like to small round
roots, the which is rare in that metal, but usuall in Gold; Concerning which
metal he tells us, that besides this they find some which they call Gold in
grains, which he tells us are small morsels of Gold that they find whole
without mixture of any other metal, which hath no need of melting or
Refining in the fire.
I remember that a very skilful and credible person affirmed to me, that
being in the Hungarian mines he had the good fortune to see a mineral that
was there digg’d up, wherein pieces of Gold of the length, and also almost
of the bigness of a humane Finger, grew in the Oar, as if they had been parts
and Branches of Trees.
And I have my self seen a Lump of whitish Mineral, that was brought as a
Rarity to a Great and knowing Prince, wherein there grew here and there in
the Stone, which looked like a kind of sparr, divers little Lumps of fine

Gold, (for such I was assured that Tryal had manifested it to be) some of
them Seeming to be about the Bigness of pease.
But that is nothing to what our Acosta See Acosta in the fore-cited Place, and the
passage of Pliny quoted by him. subjoynes, which is indeed very memorable,
namely, that of the morsels of Native and pure Gold, which we lately heard
him mentioning he had now and then seen some that weighed many
pounds; to which I shall add, that I my self have seen a Lump of Oar not
long since digged up, in whose stony part there grew, almost like Trees,
divers parcels though not of Gold, yet of (what perhaps Mineralists will
more wonder at) another Metal which seemed to be very pure or unmixt
with any Heterogeneous Substances, and were some of them as big as my
Finger, if not bigger. But upon Observations of this kind, though perhaps I
could, yet I must not at present dwell any longer.
To proceed Therefore now (sayes Carneades) to the Consideration of the
Analysis of Vegetables, although my Tryals give me no cause to doubt but
that out of most of them five differing Substances may be obtain’d by the
fire, yet I think it will not be so easily Demonstrated that these deserve to be
call’d Elements in the Notion above explain’d.
And before I descend to particulars, I shall repeat and premise this General
Consideration, that these differing substances that are call’d Elements or
Principles, differ not from each other as Metals, Plants and Animals, or as
such Creatures as are immediately produc’d each by its peculiar Seed, and
Constitutes a distinct propagable sort of Creatures in the Universe; but these
are only Various Schemes of matter or Substances that differ from each
other, but in consistence (as Running Mercury and(174) the same Metal
congeal’d by the Vapor of Lead) and some very few other accidents, as Tast,
or Smel, or Inflamability, or the want of them. So that by a change of
Texture not impossible to be wrought by the Fire and other Agents that have
the Faculty not only to dissociate the smal parts of Bodies, but afterwards to
connect them after a new manner, the same parcell of matter may acquire or
lose such accidents as may suffice to Denominate it Salt, or Sulphur, or
Earth. If I were fully to clear to you my apprehensions concerning this
matter, I should perhaps be obliged to acquaint you with divers of the
Conjectures (for I must yet call them no more) I have had Concerning the
Principles of things purely Corporeal: For though because I seem not

satisfi’d with the Vulgar Doctrines, either of the Peripatetick or Paracelsian
Schools, many of those that know me, (and perhaps, among Them,
Eleutherius himself) have thought me wedded to the Epicurean Hypotheses,
(as others have mistaken me for an Helmontian;) yet if you knew how little
Conversant I have been with Epicurean Authors, and how great a part of
Lucretius himself I never yet had the Curiosity to read, you would
perchance be of another mind; especially if I were to entertain you at large,
I say not, of my present Notions; but of my former thoughts concerning the
Principles of things. But, as I said above, fully to clear my Apprehensions
would require a Longer Discourse than we can now have.
For, I should tell you that I have sometimes thought it not unfit, that to the
Principles which may be assign’d to things, as the World is now
Constituted, we should, if we consider the Great Mass of matter as it was
whilst the Universe was in making, add another, which may Conveniently
enough be call’d an Architectonick Principle or power; by which I mean
those Various Determinations, and that Skilfull Guidance of the motions of
the small parts of the Universal matter by the most wise Author of things,
which were necessary at the beginning to turn that confus’d Chaos into this
Orderly and beautifull World; and Especially, to contrive the Bodies of
Animals and Plants, and the Seeds of those things whose kinds were to be
propagated. For I confess I cannot well Conceive, how from matter, Barely
put into Motion, and then left to it self, there could Emerge such Curious
Fabricks as the Bodies of men and perfect Animals, and such yet more
admirably Contriv’d parcels of matter, as the seeds of living Creatures.
I should likewise tell you upon what grounds, and in what sence, I
suspected the Principles of the World, as it now is, to be Three, Matter,
Motion and Rest. I say, as the World now is, because the present Fabrick of
the Universe, and especially the seeds of things, together with the establisht
Course of Nature, is a Requisite or Condition, upon whose account divers
things may be made out by our three Principles, which otherwise would be
very hard, if possible, to explicate.
I should moreover declare in general (for I pretend not to be able to do it
otherwise) not only why I Conceive that Colours, Odors, Tasts, Fluidness
and Solidity, and those other qualities that Diversifie and Denominate
Bodies may Intelligibly be Deduced from these three; but how two of the

Three Epicurean Principles (which, I need not tell, you are Magnitude,
Figure and Weight) are Themselves Deducible from Matter and Motion;
since the Latter of these Variously Agitating, and, as it were, Distracting the
Former, must needs disjoyne its parts; which being Actually separated must
Each of them necessarily both be of some Size, and obtain some shape or
other. Nor did I add to our Principles the Aristotelean Privation, partly for
other Reasons, which I must not now stay to insist on; and partly because it
seems to be rather an Antecedent, or a Terminus a quo, then a True
Principle, as the starting-Post is none of the Horses Legs or Limbs.
I should also explain why and how I made rest to be, though not so
considerable a Principle of things, as Motion, yet a Principle of them; partly
because it is (for ought we know as Ancient at least as it, and depends not
upon Motion, nor any other quality of matter; and partly, because it may
enable the Body in which it happens to be, both to continue in a State of
Rest till some external force put it out of that state, and to concur to the
production of divers Changes in the bodies that hit against it, by either quite
stopping or lessning their Motion (whilst the body formerly at Rest
Receives all or part of it into it self) or else by giving a new Byass, or some
other Modification, to Motion, that is, To the Grand and Primary instrument
whereby Nature produces all the Changes and other Qualities that are to be
met with in the World.
I should likewise, after all this, explain to you how, although Matter,
Motion and Rest, seem’d to me to be the Catholick Principles of the
Universe, I thought the Principles of Particular bodies might be
Commodiously enough reduc’d to two, namely Matter, and (what
Comprehends the two other, and their effects) the result or Aggregate of
those Accidents, which are the Motion or Rest, (for in some Bodies both are
not to be found) the Bigness, Figure, Texture) and the thence resulting
Qualities of the small parts) which are necessary to intitle the Body whereto
they belong to this or that Peculiar Denomination; and discriminating it
from others to appropriate it to a Determinate Kind of Things, as
Yellowness, Fixtness, such a Degree of Weight, and of Ductility, do make
the Portion of matter wherein they Concur, to be reckon’d among perfect
metals, and obtain the name of Gold.) Which Aggregate or result of
Accidents you may, if You please, call either Structure or Texture.

Though indeed, that do not so properly Comprehend the motion of the
constituent parts especially in case some of them be Fluid, or what other
appellation shall appear most Expressive. Or if, retaining the Vulgar Terme,
You will call it the Forme of the thing it denominates, I shall not much
oppose it; Provided the word be interpreted to mean but what I have
express’d, and not a Scholastick Substantial Forme, which so many
intelligent men profess to be to them altogether Un-intelligible.
But, sayes Carneades, if you remember that ’tis a Sceptick speaks to you,
and that ’tis not so much my present Talk to make assertions as to suggest
doubts, I hope you will look upon what I have propos’d, rather as a
Narrative of my former conjectures touching the principles of things, then
as a Resolute Declaration of my present opinions of them; especially since
although they cannot but appear Very much to their Disadvantage, If you
Consider Them as they are propos’d without those Reasons and
Explanations by which I could perhaps make them appear much lesse
extravagant; yet I want time to offer you what may be alledg’d to clear and
countenance these notions; my design in mentioning them unto you at
present being, partly, to bring some Light and Confirmation to divers
passages of my discourse to you; partly to shew you, that I do not (as you
seem to have suspected) embrace all Epicurus his principles; but Dissent
from him in some main things, as well as from Aristotle and the Chymists,
in others; & partly also, or rather chiefly, to intimate to you the grounds
upon which I likewise differ from Helmont in this, that whereas he ascribes
almost all things, and even diseases themselves, to their determinate Seeds;
I am of opinion, that besides the peculiar Fabricks of the Bodies of Plants
and Animals (and perhaps also of some Metals and Minerals) which I take
to be the Effects of seminal principles, there are many other bodies in nature
which have and deserve distinct and Proper names, but yet do but result
from such contextures of the matter they are made of, as may without
determinate seeds be effected by heat, cold, artificial mixtures and
compositions, and divers other causes which sometimes nature imployes of
her own accord; and oftentimes man by his power and skill makes use of to
fashion the matter according to his Intentions. This may be exemplified
both in the productions of Nature, and in those of Art; of the first sort I
might name multitudes; but to shew how sleight a variation of Textures

without addition of new ingredients may procure a parcel of matter divers
names, and make it be Lookt upon as Different Things;
I shall invite you to observe with me, That Clouds, Rain, Hail, Snow, Froth,
and Ice, may be but water, having its parts varyed as to their size and
distance in respect of each other, and as to motion(383) and rest. And among
Artificial Productions we may take notice (to skip the Crystals of Tartar) of
Glass, Regulus, Martis-Stellatus, and particularly of the Sugar of Lead,
which though made of that insipid Metal and sour salt of Vinager, has in it a
sweetnesse surpassing that of common Sugar, and divers other qualities,
which being not to be found in either of its two ingredients, must be
confess’d to belong to the Concrete it self, upon the account of its Texture.
This Consideration premis’d, it will be, I hope, the more easie to perswade
you that the Fire may as well produce some new textures in a parcel of
matter, as destroy the old.
Wherefore hoping that you have not forgot the Arguments formerly
imploy’d against the Doctrine of the Tria prima; namely that the Salt,
Sulphur and Mercury, into which the Fire seems to resolve Vegetable and
Animal Bodies, are yet compounded, not simple and Elementary
Substances; And that (as appeared by the Experiment of Pompions) the Tria
prima may be made out of Water; hoping I say, that you remember These
and the other Things that I formerly represented(382) to the same purpose, I
shall now add only, that if we doubt not the Truth of some of Helmonts
Relation, We may well doubt whether any of these Heterogeneities be (I say
not pre-existent, so as to convene together, when a plant or Animal is to be
constituted but) so much as in-existent in the Concrete whence they are
obtain’d, when the Chymists first goes about to resolve it; For not to insist
upon the un-inflamable Spirit of such Concretes, because that may be
pretended to be but a mixture of Phlegme and Salt; the Oyle or Sulphur of
Vegetables or Animals is, according to him, reducible by the help of
Lixiviate Salts into Sope; as that Sope is by the help of repeated
Distillations from a Caput Mortuum of Chalk into insipid Water. And as for
the saline substance that seems separable from mixt bodies; the same
Helmonts tryals Omne autem Alcali addita pinguedine in aqueum liquorem, qui tandem mera
& simplex aqua fit, reducitur, (ut videre est in Sapone, Lazurio lapide, &c.) quoties per adjuncta
fixa semen Pinguedinis deponit. Helmont. give us cause to think, That it may be a

production of the Fire, which by transporting and otherwise altering the
particles of the matter, does bring it to a Saline nature.
For I know (sayes he, in the place formerly alledg’d to another purpose) a
way to reduce all stones into a meer Salt of equal weight with the stone
whence it was produc’d, and that without any of the least either Sulphur or
Mercury; which asseveration of my Author would perhaps seem less
incredible to You, if I durst acquaint You with all I could say upon that
subject. And hence by the way you may also conclude that the Sulphur and
Mercury, as they call them, that Chymists are wont to obtain from
compound Bodies by the Fire, may possibly in many Cases be the
productions of it; since if the same bodies had been wrought upon by the
Agents employ’d by Helmont, they would have yielded neither Sulphur nor
Mercury; and those portions of them which the Fire would have presented
Us in the forme of Sulphureous and Mercurial Bodies would have, by
Helmonts method, been exhibited to us in the form of Salt.
But though (sayes Eleutherius) You have alledg’d very plausible Arguments
against the tria Prima, yet I see not how it will be possible for you to avoid
acknowledging that Earth and Water are Elementary Ingredients, though not
of Mineral Concretes, yet of all Animal and Vegetable Bodies; Since if any
of these of what sort soever be committed to Distillation, there is regularly
and constantly separated from it a phlegme or aqueous part and a Caput
Mortuum or Earth.
I readily acknowledged (answers Carneades) it is not so easy to reject
Water and Earth (and especially the former) as ’tis to reject the Tria Prima,
from being the Elements of mixt Bodies; but ’tis not every difficult thing
that is impossible.
I consider then, as to Water, that the chief Qualities which make men give
that name to any visible Substance, are, that it is Fluid or Liquid, and that it
is insipid and inodorous. Now as for the tast of these qualities, I think you
have never seen any of those separated substances that the Chymists call
Phlegme which was perfectly devoyd both of Tast and Smell: and if you
object, that yet it may be reasonably suppos’d, that since the whole Body is
Liquid, the mass is nothing but Elementary Water faintly imbu’d with some
of the Saline or Sulphureous parts of the same Concrete, which it retain’d

with it upon its Separation from the Other Ingredients. To this I answer,
That this Objection would not appear so stong as it is plausible, if Chymists
understood the Nature of Fluidity and Compactnesse; and that, as I formerly
observ’d, to a Bodies being Fluid there is nothing necessary, but that it be
divided into parts small enough; and that these parts be put into such a
motion among themselves as to glide some this way and some that way,
along each others Surfaces. So that, although a Concrete were never so dry,
and had not any Water or other Liquor in-existent in it, yet such a
Comminution of its parts may be made, by the fire or other Agents, as to
turn a great portion of them into Liquor. Of this Truth I will give an
instance, employ’d by our friend here present as one of the most conducive
of his experiments to Illustrate the nature of Salts. If you Take, then, sea salt
and melt it in the Fire to free it from the aqueous parts, and afterward distill
it with a vehement Fire from burnt Clay, or any other, as dry a Caput
mortuum as you please, you will, as Chymists confess, by teaching it drive
over a good part of the Salt in the form of a Liquor. And to satisfy some
ingenious men, That a great part of this Liquor was still true sea salt
brought by the Operation of the Fire into Corpuscles so small, and perhaps
so advantageously shap’d, as to be capable of the forme of a Fluid Body, He
did in my presence poure to such spiritual salts a due proportion of the spirit
(or salt and Phlegme) of Urine, whereby having evaporated the superfluous
moisture, he soon obtain’d such another Concrete, both as to tast and smell,
and easie sublimableness as common Salt Armoniack, which you know is
made up of grosse and undistill’d sea salt united with the salts of Urine and
of Soot, which two are very neer of kin to each other. And further, to
manifest that the Corpuscles of sea salt and the Saline ones of Urine retain
their several Natures in this Concrete, He mixt it with a convenient quantity
of Salt of Tartar, and committing it to Distillation soon regain’d his spirit of
Urine in a liquid form by its self, the Sea salt staying behind with the Salt of
Tartar. Wherefore it is very possible that dry Bodies may by the Fire be
reduc’d to Liquors without any separation of Elements, but barely by a
certain kind of Dissipation and Comminution of the matter, whereby its
parts are brought into a new state. And if it be still objected, that the
Phlegme of mixt Bodies must be reputed water, because so weak a tast
needs but a very small proportion of Salt to impart it; It may be reply’d, that
for ought appears, common Salt and divers other bodies, though they be
distill’d never so dry, and in never so close Vessels, will yield each of them

pretty store of a Liquor, wherein though (as I lately noted) Saline
Corpuscles abound, Yet there is besides a large proportion of Phlegme, as
may easily be discovered by coagulating the Saline Corpuscles with any
convenient Body; as I lately told you, our Friend coagulated part of the
Spirit of Salt with Spirit of Urine: and as I have divers times separated a salt
from Oyle of Vitriol it self (though a very ponderous Liquor and drawn
from a saline body) by boyling it with a just quantity of Mercury, and then
washing the newly coagulated salt from the Precipitate with fair Water.
Now to what can we more probably ascribe this plenty of aqueous
Substance afforded us by the Distillation of such bodies, than unto this,
That among the various operations of the Fire upon the matter of a
Concrete, divers particles of that matter are reduc’d to such a shape and
bignesse as is requisite to compose such a Liquor as Chymists are wont to
call Phlegme or Water. How I conjecture this change may be effected, ’tis
neither necessary for me to tell you, nor possible to do so without a much
longer discourse then were now seasonable. But I desire you would with me
reflect upon what I formerly told you concerning the change of Quicksilver
into Water; For that Water having but a very faint tast, if any whit more than
divers of those liquors that Chymists referr to Phlegme; By that experiment
it seems evident, that even a metalline body, and therefore much more such
as are but Vegetable or Animal, may by a simple operation of the Fire be
turn’d in great part into Water. And since those I dispute with are not yet
able out of Gold, or Silver, or divers other Concretes to separate any thing
like Water; I hope I may be allow’d to conclude against Them, that water it
self is not an Universal and pre-existent Ingredient of Mixt Bodies.
But as for those Chymists that, Supposing with me the Truth of what
Helmont relates of the Alkahest’s wonderful Effects, have a right to press
me with his Authority concerning them, and to alledge that he could
Transmute all reputedly mixt Bodies into insipid and meer Water; To those I
shall represent, That though his Affirmations conclude strongly against the
Vulgar Chymists (against whom I have not therefore scrupl’d to Employ
Them) since they Evince that the Commonly reputed Principles or
Ingredients of Things are not Permanent and indestructible, since they may
be further reduc’d into Insipid Phlegme differing from them all; Yet till we
can be allow’d to examine this Liquor, I think it not unreasonable to doubt
whether it be not something else then meer Water. For I find not any other

reason given by Helmont of his Pronouncing it so, then that it is insipid.
Now Sapour being an Accident or an Affection of matter that relates to our
Tongue, Palate, and other Organs of Tast, it may very possibly be, that the
small Parts of a Body may be of such a Size and Shape, as either by their
extream Littleness, or by their slenderness, or by their Figure, to be unable
to pierce into and make a perceptible Impression upon the Nerves or
Membranous parts of the Organs of Tast, and what may be fit to work
otherwise upon divers other Bodies than meer Water can, and consequently
to Disclose it self to be of a Nature farr enough from Elementary. In Silke
dyed Red or of any other Colour, whilst many Contiguous Threads makes
up a skein, the Colour of the Silke is conspicuous; but if only a very few of
them be lookt upon, the Colour will appear much fainter then before. But if
You take out one simple Thread, you shall not easily be able to discern any
Colour at all; So subtile an Object having not the Force to make upon the
Optick Nerve an Impression great enough to be taken Notice of. It is also
observ’d, that the best sort of Oyl-Olive is almost tastless, and yet I need
not tell you how exceedingly distant in Nature Oyle is from Water. The
Liquor into which I told you, upon the Relation of Lully, and Eye-witness
that Mercury might be Transmuted, has sometimes but a very Languid, if
any Tast, and yet its Operations even upon some Mineral Bodies are very
peculiar. Quicksilver it self also, though the Corpuscles it consists of be so
very small as to get into the Pores of that Closest and compactest of Bodies,
Gold, is yet (you know) altogether Tastless. And our Helmont several times
tells us, that fair Water wherein a little Quantity f Quicksilver has lain for
some time, though it acquire no certain Tast or other sensible Quality from
the Quicksilver; Yet it has a power to destroy wormes in humane Bodies;
which he does much, but not causelessly extoll. And I remember, a great
Lady, that had been Eminent for her Beauty in Divers Courts, confess’d to
me, that this insipid Liquor was of all innocent washes for the Face the best
that she ever met with.
And here let me conclude my Discourse, concerning such waters or Liquors
as I have hitherto been examining, with these two Considerations. Whereof
the first is, That by reason of our being wont to drink nothing but Wine,
Bear, Cyder, or other strongly tasted Liquors, there may be in several of
these Liquors, that are wont to pass for insipid Phlegme, very peculiar and
Distinct, Tasts though unheeded (and perhaps not to be perceiv’d) by Us.

For to omit what Naturalists affirm of Apes, (and which probably may be
true of divers other Animals) that they have a more exquisite palate than
Men: among Men themselves, those that are wont to drink nothing but
water may (as I have try’d in my self) Discern very sensibly a great
Difference of Tasts in several waters, which one un-accustomed to drink
water would take to be all alike insipid. And this is the first of my two
Considerations; the Other is, That it is not impossible that the Corpuscles
into which a body is dissipated by the Fire may by the Operation of the
same fire have their figures so altered, or may be by associations with one
another brought into little Masses of such a Size and Shape, as not to be fit
to make sensible Impressions on the Tongue. And that you may not think
such alterations impossible, be pleased to consider with me, that not only
the sharpest Spirit of Vinager having dissolved as much Corall as it can,
will Coagulate with it into a Substance, which though soluble in water, like
salt, is incomparably less strongly Tasted then the Vinager was before; but
(what is more considerable) though the Acid salts that are carried up with
Quicksilver in the preparation of common sublimate are so sharp, that being
moistened with water it will Corrode some of the Metals themselves; yet
this Corrosive Sublimate being twice or thrice re-sublim’d with a full
proportion of insipid Quicksilver, Constitutes (as you know) that Factitious
Concrete, which the Chymists call Mercurius dulcis; not because it is sweet,
but because the sharpness of the Corrosive Salts is so taken away by their
Combination with the Mercurial Corpuscles, that the whole mixture when it
is prepar’d is judg’d to be insipid.
And thus (continues Carneades) having given you some Reasons why I
refuse to admit Elementary water for a constant Ingredient of Mixt Bodies,
It will be easie for me to give you an Account why I also reject Earth.
For first, it may well be suspected that many Substances pass among
Chymists under the name of Earth, because, like it, they are Dry, and
Heavy, and Fixt, which yet are very farr from an Elementary Nature. This
you will not think improbable, If you recall to mind what I formerly told
you concerning what Chymists call the Dead Earth of things, and especially
touching the copper to be drawn from the Caput Mortuum of Vitriol; And if
also you allow me to subjoyn a casual but memorable Experiment made by
Johannes Agricola upon the Terra Damnata of Brimstone. Our Author then
tells us (in his notes upon Popius,) that in the year 1621 he made an Oyle of

Sulphur; the remaining Fæces he reverberated in a moderate Fire fourteen
dayes; afterwards he put them well luted up in a Wind Oven, and gave them
a strong Fire for six hours, purposing to calcine the Fæces to a perfect
Whiteness, that he might make someting else out of them. But coming to
break the pot, he found above but very little Fæces, and those Grey and not
White; but beneath there lay a fine Red Regulus which he first marvell’d at
and knew not what to make of, being well assured that not the least thing,
besides the Fæces of the Sulphur, came into the pot; and that the Sulphur it
self had only been dissolv’d in Linseed Oyle; this Regulus he found heavy
and malleable almost as Lead; having caus’d a Goldsmith to draw him a
Wire of it, he found it to be of the Fairest copper, and so rightly colour’d,
that a Jew of Prague offer’d him a great price for it. And of this Metal he
sayes he had 12 loth (or six ounces) out of one pound of Ashes or Fæces.
And this Story may well incline us to suspect that since the Caput Mortuum
of the Sulphur was kept so long in the fire before it was found to be any
thing else then a Terra damnata, there may be divers other Residences of
Bodies which are wont to pass only for the Terrestrial Fæces of things, and
therefore to be thrown away as soon as the Distillation or Calcination of the
Body that yielded them is ended; which yet if they were long and Skilfully
examin’d by the fire would appear to be differing from Elementary Earth.
And I have taken notice of the unwarrantable forwardness of common
Chymists to pronounce things useless Fæces, by observing how often they
reject the Caput Mortuum of Verdegrease; which is yet so farr from
deserving that Name, that not only by strong fires and convenient
Additaments it may in some hours be reduc’d into copper, but with a certain
Flux Powder I sometimes make for Recreation, I have in two or three
minutes obtain’d that Metal from it. To which I may add, that having for
tryall sake kept Venetian Taclk in no less a heat than that of a glass Furnace,
I found after all the Brunt of the fire it had indur’d, the remaining Body
though brittle and discolour’d, had not lost very much of its former Bulke,
and seem’d still to be nearer of kin to Talck than to meer Earth. And I
remember too, that a candid Mineralist, famous for his Skill in trying of
Oars, requesting me one day to procure him a certain American Mineral
Earth of a Virtuoso, who he thought would not refuse me; I enquir’d of him
why he seem’d so greedy of it: he confess’d to me that this Gentleman
having brought that Earth to the publick Say-Masters; and they upon their
being unable by any means to bring it to fusion or make it fly away, he (the

Relator) had procur’d a little of it; and having try’d it with a peculiar Flux
separated from it neer a third part of pure Gold; so great mistakes may be
committed in hastily concluding things to be Uselesse Earth.
Next, it may be suppos’d, That as in the Resolution of Bodies by the Fire
some of the dissipated Parts may, by their various occursion occasion’d by
the heat, be brought to stick together so closely as to constitute Corpuscles
too heavy for the Fire to carry away; the aggregate of which Corpuscles is
wont to be call’d Ashes or Earrh; So other Agents may resolve the Concrete
into Minute Parts, after so differing a manner as not to produce any Caput
mortuum, or dry and heavy Body. As you may remember Helmont above
inform’d us, that with his great Dissolvent he divided a Coal into two liquid
and volatile Bodies, æquiponderant to the Coal, without any dry or fixt
Residence at all.
And indeed, I see not why it should be necessary that all Agents that resolve
Bodies into portions of differingly qualifi’d matter must work on them the
same way, and divide them into just such parts, both for nature and Number,
as the Fire dissipates them into. For since, as I noted before, the Bulk and
shape of the small Parts of bodies, together with their Fitness and Unfitness
to be easily put into Motion, may make the liquors or other substances such
Corpuscles compose, as much to differ from each other as do some of the
Chymical principles: Why may not something happen in this case, not
unlike what is usuall in the grosser divisions of bodies by Mechanical
Instruments? Where we see that some Tools reduce Wood, for Instance, into
darts of several shapes, bignesse, and other qualities, as Hatchets and
Wedges divide it into grosser parts; some more long and slender, as
splinters; and some more thick and irregular, as chips; but all of
considerable bulk; but Files and Saws makes a Comminution of it into
Dust; which, as all the others, is of the more solid sort of parts; whereas
others divide it into long and broad, but thin and flexible parts, as do
Planes: And of this kind of parts it self there is also a variety according to
the Difference of the Tools employ’d to work on the Wood; the shavings
made by the plane being in some things differing from those shives or thin
and flexible pieces of wood that are obtain’d by Borers, and these from
some others obtainable by other Tools. Some Chymical Examples
applicable to this purpose I have elsewhere given you. To which I may add,
that whereas in a mixture of Sulphur and Salt of Tartar well melted and

incorporated together, the action of pure spirit of wine digested on it is to
separate the sulphureous from the Alcalizate Parts, by dissolving the former
and leaving the latter, the action of Wine (probably upon the score of its
copious Phlegme) upon the same mixture is to divide it into Corpuscles
consisting of both Alcalizate and Sulphureous Parts united. And if it be
objected, that this is but a Factitious Concrete; I answer, that however the
instance may serve to illustrate what I propos’d, if not to prove it; and that
Nature her self doth in the bowels of the Earth make Decompounded
Bodies, as we see in Vitriol, Cinnaber, and even in Sulphur it self; I will not
urge that the Fire divides new Milk into five differing Substances; but
Runnet and Acid Liquors divide it into a Coagulated matter and a thin
Whey: And on the other side churning divides it into Butter and Butter-
milk, which may either of them be yet reduc’d to other substances differing
from the former. I will not presse this, I say, nor other instances of this
Nature, because I cannot in few words answer what may be objected, that
these Concretes sequestred without the help of the Fire may by it be further
divided into Hypostatical Principles. But I will rather represent, That
whereas the same spirit of Wine will dissociare the Parts of Camphire, and
make them one Liquor with it self; Aqua Fortis will also disjoyn them, and
put them into motion; but so as to keep them together, and yet alter their
Texture into the form of an Oyle. I know also an uncompounded Liquor,
that an extraordinary Chymist would not allow to be so much as Saline,
which doth (as I have try’d) from Coral it self (as fixt as divers judicious
writers assert that Concrete to be) not only obtain a noble Tincture, Without
the Intervention of Nitre or other Salts; but will carry over the Tincture in
Distillation. And if some reasons did not forbid me, I could now tell you of
a Menstruum I make my self, that doth more odly dissociate the parts of
Minerals very fixt in the fire. So that it seems not incredible, that there may
be some Agent or way of Operation found, whereby this or that Concrete, if
not all Firme Bodies, may be resolv’d into parts so very minute and so
unapt to stick close to one another, that none of them may be fixt enough to
stay behind in a strong Fire, and to be incapable of Distillation; nor
consequently to be look’d upon as Earth. But to return to Helmont, the same
Authour somewhere supply’s me with another Argument against the Earth’s
being such an Element as my Adversaries would have it. For he somewhere
affirms, that he can reduce all the Terrestrial parts of mixt bodies into
insipid water; whence we may argue against the Earths being one of their

Elements, even from that Notion of Elements which you may remember
Philoponus recited out of Aristotle himself, when he lately disputed for his
Chymists against Themistius. And here we may on this occasion consider,
that since a Body from which the Fire hath driven away its looser parts is
wont to be look’d upon as Earth, upon the Account of its being endow’d
with both these qualities, Tastlessenesse and Fixtnesse, (for Salt of Tartar
though Fixt passes not among the Chymists for Earth, because ’tis strongly
Tasted) if it be in the power of Natural Agents to deprive the Caput
Mortuum of a body of either of those two Qualities, or to give them both to
a portion of matter that had them not both before, the Chymists will not
easily define what part of a resolv’d Concrete is earth, and make out, that
that Earth is a primary, simple, and indestructible Body. Now there are
some cases wherein the more skilful of the Vulgar Chymists themselves
pretend to be able, by repeated Cohobations and other fit Operations, to
make the Distilled parts of a Concrete bring its own Caput Mortuum over
the Helme, in the forme of a Liquor; in which state being both Fluid and
Volatile, you will easily believe it would not be taken for Earth. And indeed
by a skilful, but not Vulgar, way of managing some Concretes, there may be
more effected in this kind, then you perhaps would easily think. And on the
other side, that either Earth may be Generated, or at least Bodies that did
not before appear to be neer Totally Earth, may be so alter’d as to pass for
it, seems very possible, if Helmont Novi item modos quibus totum Salpetiæ in terram
convertitur, totumque Sulphur semel dissolutum fixetur in Pulvearem terreum. Helmont in Compl.
atque Mist. Elementor. Sect. 24. have done that by Art which he mentions in
several places; especially where He sayes that he knowes wayes whereby
Sulphur once dissolv’d is all of it fix’d into a Terrestrial Powder; and the
whole Bodie of Salt-Petre may be turn’d into Earth: Which last he
elsewhere sayes is Done by the Odour only of a certain Sulphureous Fire.
And in another place He mentions one way of doing this, which I cannot
give you an Account of; because the Materialls I had prepar’d for Trying it,
were by a Servants mistake unhappily thrown away.
And these Last Arguments may be confirm’d by the Experiment I have
often had occasion to mention concerning the Mint I produc’d out of Water.
And partly by an Observation of Rondeletius concerning the Growth of
Animals also, Nourish’d but by Water, which I remember’d not to mention,
when I discours’d to you about the Production of things out of Water. This

Diligent Writer then in his instructive book of fishes, Lib. 1. cap. 2. affirmes
That his Wife kept a fish in a Glass of water without any other Food for
three years; in which space it was constantly augmented, till at last it could
not come out of the Place at which it was put in, and at length was too big
for the glass it self though that were of a large capacity. And because there
is no just reason to doubt, that this Fish, if Distill’d, would have yielded the
like differing substances with other Animals: And However, because the
Mint which I had out of water afforded me upon Distillation a good
quantity of Charcoal, I think I may from thence inferr, that Earth it self may
be produc’d out of Water; or if you please, that water may be transmuted
into Earth; and consequently, that though it could be prov’d that Earth is an
Ingredient actually in-existent in the Vegetable and Animal Bodies whence
it may be obtain’d by Fire: yet it would not necessarily follow, that Earth as
a pre-existent Element Does with other Principles convene to make up those
Bodies whence it seems to have been separated.
After all is said (sayes Eleutherius) I have yet something to Object, that I
cannot but think considerable, since Carneades Himself alledg’d it as such;
for, (continues Eleutherius smiling) I must make bold to try whether you
can as luckily answer your own Arguments, as those of your Antagonists, I
mean (pursues he) that part of your Concessions, wherein you cannot but
remember that you supply’d your Adversaries with an Example to prove
that there may be Elementary Bodies, by taking Notice that Gold may be an
Ingredient in a multitude of differing Mixtures, and yet retain its Nature,
notwithstanding all that the Chymists by their Fires and Corrosive Waters
are able to do to Destroy it.
I sufficiently intimated to you at that time (replies Carneades) that I
propos’d this Example, chiefly to shew you how Nature may be Conceived
to have made Elements, not to prove that she actually has made any; And
you know, that a posse ad esse the Inference will not hold. But (continues
Carneades) to answer more directly to the Objection drawn from Gold, I
must tell You, that though I know very well that divers of the more sober
Chymists have complain’d of the Vulgar Chymists, as of Mountebanks or
Cheats, for pretending so vainly, as hitherto they have done, to Destroy
Gold; Yet I know a certain Menstruum (which our Friend has made, and
intends shortly to communicate to the Ingenious) of so piercing and
powerfull a Quality, That if notwithstanding much care, and some skill, I

did not much deceive myself, I have with it really destroy’d even refin’d
Gold, and brought it into a Metalline Body of another colour and Nature, as
I found by Tryals purposely made. And if some just Considerations did not
for the present Forbid it, I could Perchance here shew you by another
Experiment or Two of my own Trying, that such Menstruums may be made
as to entice away and retain divers parts, from Bodies, which even the more
Judicious and Experienc’d Spagyrists have pronounc’d irresoluble by the
Fire. Though (which I Desire you would mark) in neither of these Instances,
the Gold or Precious Stones be Analys’d into any of the Tria Prima, but
only Reduc’d to new Concretes. And indeed there is a great Disparity
betwixt the Operations of the several Agents whereby the Parts of a Body
come to be Dissipated. As if (for Instance) you dissolve the purer sort of
Vitriol in common Water, the Liquor will swallow up the Mineral, and so
Dissociate its Corpuscles, that they will seem to make up but one Liquor
with those of the water; and yet each of these Corpuscles retains its Nature
and Texture, and remains a Vitriolate and Compounded Body. But if the
same Vitriol be exposed to a strong Fire, it will then be divided not only, as
before, into smaller parts, but into Heterogeneous Substances, each of the
Vitriolate Corpuscles that remain’d entire in the water, being it self upon the
Destruction of its former Texture dissipated or divided into new Particles of
differing Qualities. But Instances more fitly applicable to this purpose, I
have already given you. Wherefore to return to what I told you about the
Destruction of Gold, that Experiment Invites me to Represent to you, that
Though there were either Saline, or Sulphureous, or Terrestrial Portions of
Matter, whose parts were so small, so firmly united together, or of a figure
so fit to make them cohere to one another, (as we see that in quicksilver
broken into little Globes, the Parts brought to touch one another do
immediately re-imbody) that neither the Fire, nor the usual Agents
employ’d by Chymists, are pierceing enough to divide their Parts, so as to
destroy the Texture of the single Corpuscles; yet it would not necessarily
follow, That such Permanent Bodies were Elementary, since tis possible
there may be Agents found in Nature, some of whose parts may be of such a
Size and Figure as to take better Hold of some parts of these seemingly
Elementary Corpuscles than these parts do of the rest, and Consequently
may carry away such parts with them, and so dissolve the Texture of the
Corpuscle by pulling its parts asunder. And if it be said, that at least we may
this way discover the Elementary Ingredients of Things, by observing into

what Substances these Corpuscles that were reputed pure are divided; I
answer, that it is not necessary that such a Discovery should be practicable.
For if the Particles of the Dissolvent do take such firme hold of those of the
Dissolved Body, they must constitute together new Bodies, as well as
Destroy the Old; and the strickt Union, which according to this Hypothesis
may well be suppos’d betwixt the Parts of the Emergent Body, will make it
as Little to be Expected that they should be pull’d asunder, but by little
Parts of matter, that to Divide them Associate Themselves and stick
extreamly close to those of them which they sever from their Former
Adherents. Besides that it is not impossible, that a Corpuscle suppos’d to be
Elementary may have its Nature changed, without suffering a Divorce of its
parts, barely by a new Texture Effected by some powerfull Agent; as I
formerly told you, the same portion of matter may easily by the Operation
of the Fire be turn’d at pleasure into the form of a Brittle and Transparent,
or an Opacous and Malleable Body.
And indeed, if you consider how farr the bare Change of Texture, whether
made by Art or Nature (or rather by Nature with or without the assistance of
man) can go in producing such New Qualities in the same parcel of matter,
and how many inanimate Bodies (such as are all the Chymical productions
of the Fire) we know are Denominated and Distinguish’d not so much by
any Imaginary Substantial Form, as by the aggregate of these Qualities. If
you consider these Things, I say, and that the varying of either the figure, or
the Size, or the Motion, or the Situation, or Connexion of the Corpuscles
whereof any of these Bodies is compos’d, may alter the Fabrick of it, you
will possibly be invited to suspect, with me, that there is no great need that
Nature should alwayes have Elements before hand, whereof to make such
Bodies as we call mixts. And that it is not so easie as Chymists and others
have hitherto Imagin’d, to discern, among the many differing Substances
that may without any extraordinary skill be obtain’d from the same portion
of matter, Which ought to be esteemed exclusively to all the rest, its in-
existent Elementary Ingredients; much lesse to determine what Primogeneal
and Simple Bodies convened together to compose it. To exemplify this, I
shall add to what I have already on several occasions Represented, but this
single instance.
You may remember (Eleutherius) that I formerly intimated to you, that
besides Mint and Pompions, I produced divers other Vegetables of very

differing Natures out of Water. Wherefore you will not, I presume, think it
incongruous to suppose, that when a slender Vine-slip is set into the ground,
and takes root, there it may likewise receive its Nutriment from the water
attracted out of the earth by his roots, or impell’d by the warm’th of the sun,
or pressure of the ambient air into the pores of them. And this you will the
more easily believe, if you ever observ’d what a strange quantity of Water
will Drop out of a wound given to the Vine, in a convenient place, at a
seasonable time in the Spring; and how little of Tast or Smell this Aqua
Vitis, as Physitians call it, is endow’d with, notwithstanding what
concoction or alteration it may receive in its passage through the Vine, to
discriminate it from common Water. Supposing then this Liquor, at its first
entrance into the roots of the Vine, to be common Water; Let Us a little
consider how many various Substances may be obtain’d from it; though to
do so, I must repeat somewhat that I had a former occasion to touch upon.
And first, this Liquor being Digested in the plant, and assimilated by the
several parts of it, is turn’d into the Wood, Bark, Pith, Leaves, &c. of the
Vine; The same Liquor may be further dry’d, and fashon’d into Vine-buds,
and these a while after are advanced unto sour Grapes, which express’d
yield Verjuice, a Liquor very differing in several qualities both from Wine
and other Liquors obtainable from the Vine: These soure Grapes being by
the heat of the Sun concocted and ripened, turne to well tasted Grapes;
These if dry’d in the Sun and Distill’d, afford a fætid Oyle and a piercing
Empyreumatical Spirit, but not a Vinous Spirit; These dry’d Grapes or
Raisins boyl’d in a convenient proportion of Water make a sweet Liquor,
which being betimes distill’d afford an Oyle and Spirit much like those of
the Raisins themselves; If the juice of the Grapes be squeez’d out and put to
Ferment, it first becomes a sweet and turbid Liquor, then grows lesse sweet
and more clear, and then affords in common Distillations not an Oyle but a
Spirit, which, though inflamable like Oyle, differs much from it, in that it is
not fat, and that it will readily mingle with Water. I have likewise without
Addition obtain’d in processe of time (and by an easie way which I am
ready to teach you) from one of the noblest sorts of Wine, pretty store of
pure and curiously figured Crystals of Salt, together with a great proportion
of a Liquor as sweet almost as Hony; and these I obtained not from Must,
but True and sprightly Wine; besides the Vinous Liquor, the fermented Juice
of Grapes is partly turned into liquid Dregs or Leeze, and partly into that
crust or dry feculancy that is commonly called Tartar; and this Tartar may

by the Fire be easily divided into five differing substances; four of which
are not Acid, and the other not so manifestly Acid as the Tartar it self; The
same Vinous Juice after some time, especially if it be not carefully kept,
Degenerates into that very sour Liquor called Vinegar; from which you may
obtain by the Fire a Spirit and a Crystalline Salt differing enough from the
Spirit and Lixiviate Salt of Tartar. And if you pour the Dephlegm’d Spirit of
the Vinegar upon the Salt of Tartar, there will be produc’d such a Conflict or
Ebullition as if there were scarce two more contrary Bodies in Nature; and
oftentimes in this Vinager you may observe part of the matter to be turned
into an innumerable company of swimming Animals, which our Friend
having divers years ago observed, hath in one of his Papers taught us how
to discover clearly without the help of a Microscope.
Into all these various Schemes of matter, or differingly Qualifyed Bodies,
besides divers others that I purposely forbear to mention, may the Water
that is imbib’d by the roots of the Vine be brought, partly by the formative
power of the plant, and partly by supervenient Agents or Causes, without
the visible concurrence of any extraneous Ingredient; but if we be allowed
to add to the Productions of this transmuted Water a few other substances,
we may much encrease the Variety of such Bodies; although in this second
sort of Productions, the Vinous parts seem scarce to retain any thing of the
much more fix’d Bodies wherewith they were mingl’d; but only to have by
their Mixture with them acquir’d such a Disposition, that in their recess
occasion’d by the Fire they came to be alter’d as to shape, or Bigness, or
both, and associated after a New manner. Thus, as I formerly told you, I did
by the Addition of a Caput Mortuum of Antimony, and some other Bodies
unfit for Distillation, obtain from crude Tartar, store of a very Volatile and
Crystalline Salt, differing very much in smell and other Qualities from the
usuall salts of Tartar.
But (sayes Eleutherius, interrupting him at these Words) if you have no
restraint upon you, I would very gladly before you go any further, be more
particularly inform’d, how you make this Volatile Salt, because (you know)
that such Multitudes of Chymists have by a scarce imaginable Variety of
wayes, attempted in Vain the Volatilization of the Salt of Tartar, that divers
learned Spagyrists speak as if it were impossible, to make any thing out of
Tartar, that shall be Volatile in a Saline Forme, or as some of them express
it, in forma sicca. I am very farr from thinking (answers Carneades) that the

Salt I have mention’d is that which Paracelsus and Helmont mean when
they speak of Sal Tartari Volatile, and ascribe such great things to it. For the
Salt I speak of falls extreamly short of those Virtues, not seeming in its Tast,
Smel, and other Obvious Qualities, to differ very much (though something
it do differ) from Salt of Harts-horn, and other Volatile Salts drawn from the
Distill’d Parts of Animals. Nor have I yet made Tryals enough to be sure,
that it is a pure Salt of Tartar without participating any thing at all of the
Nitre, or Antimony. But because it seems more likely to proceed from the
Tartar, than from any of the other Ingredients, and because the Experiment
is in it self not Ignoble, and Luciferous enough (as shewing a new way to
produce a Volatile Salt contrary to Acid Salts from Bodies that otherwise
are Observ’d to yield no such Liquor, but either only, or chiefly, Acid ones,)
I shall, to satisfie you, acquaint you before any of my other Friends with the
way I now use (for I have formerly us’d some others) to make it.
Take then of good Antimony, Salt-Petre and Tartar, of each an equal weight,
and of Quicklime Halfe the Weight of any one of them; let these be
powder’d and well mingl’d; this done, you must have in readiness a long
neck or Retort of Earth, which must be plac’d in a Furnace for a naked Fire,
and have at the top of it a hole of a convenient Bigness, at which you may
cast in the Mixture, and presently stop it up again; this Vessel being fitted
with a large Receiver must have Fire made under it, till the bottom of the
sides be red hot, and then you must cast in the above prepar’d Mixture, by
about halfe a spoonfull (more or less) at a time, at the hole made for that
purpose; which being nimbly stopt, the Fumes will pass into the Receiver
and condense there into a Liquor, that being rectifi’d will be of a pure
golden Colour, and carry up that colour to a great height; this Spirit abounds
in the Salt I told you of, part of which may easily enough be separated by
the way I use in such cases, which is, to put the Liquor into a glass Egg, or
bolthead with a long and narrow Neck. For if this be plac’d a little inclining
in hot sand, there will sublime up a fine Salt, which, as I told you, I find to
be much of kin to the Volatile Salts of Animals: For like them it has a
Saltish, not an Acid Salt; it hisses upon the Affusion of Spirit of Nitre, or
Oyle of Vitriol; it precipitates Corals Dissolv’d in Spirit of Vinager; it
turnes the blew Syrup of Violets immediately green; it presently turnes the
Solution of Sublimate into a Milkie whiteness; and in summ, has divers
Operations like those that I have observ’d in that sort of Salts to which I

have resembled it: and is so Volatile, that for Distinction sake, I call it
Tartari Fugitivus. What virtues it may have in Physick I have not yet had
the opportunity to Try; but I am apt to think they will not be despicable.
And besides that a very Ingenious Friend of mine tells me he hath done
great matters against the stone, with a Preparation not very much Differing
from ours, a very Experienc’d Germane Chymist finding that I was
unacquainted with the wayes of making this salt, told me that in a great City
in his Country, a noted Chymist prizes it so highly, that he had a while since
procur’d a Priviledge from the Magistrates, that none but He, or by his
Licence, should vent a Spirit made almost after the same Way with mine,
save that he leaves out one of the Ingredients, namely the Quick-lime. But,
continues Carneades, to resume my Former Discourse where your
Curiosity interrupted it;
Tis also a common practice in France to bury thin Plates of Copper in the
Marc (as the French call it) or Husks of Grapes, whence the Juice has been
squeez’d out in the Wine-press, and by this means the more saline parts of
those Husks working by little and little upon the Copper, Coagulate
Themselves with it into that Blewish Green Substance we in English call
Verdigrease. Of which I therefore take Notice, because having Distill’d it in
a Naked Fire, I found as I expected, that by the Association of the Saline
with the Metalline parts, the former were so alter’d, that the Distill’d
Liquor, even without Rectification, seem’d by smell and Tast, strong almost
like Aqua Fortis, and very much surpassed the purest and most Rectifi’d
Spirit of Vinager that ever I made. And this Spirit I therefore ascribe to the
salt of the Husks alter’d by their Co-Mixture with the copper (though the
Fire afterwards Divorce and Transmute them) because I found this later in
the bottom of the Retort in the Forme of a Crocus or redish powder: And
because Copper is of too sluggish a Nature to be forc’d over in close
Vessels by no stronger a heat. And that which is also somewhat Remarkable
in the Destillation of good Verdigrease, (or at least of that sort that I us’d) is
this, that I Never could observe that it yielded me any oyl, (unless a little
black slime which was separated in Rectification may pass for Oyle) though
both Tartar and Vinager, (especially the former) will by Destillation yield a
Moderate proportion of it. If likewise you pour Spirit of Vinager upon
Calcin’d Lead, the Acid Salt of the Liquor will by its Commixture with the
Metalline parts, though Insipid, acquire in a few hours a more than

Saccharine sweetness; and these Saline parts being by a strong Fire
Destill’d from the Lead wherewith they were imbody’d, will, as I formerly
also noted to a Different purpose, leave the Metal behind them alter’d in
some qualities from what it was, and will themselves ascend, partly in the
Forme of an unctuous Body or Oyle, partly in that of Phlegme; but for the
greatest part in the Forme of a subtile Spirit, indow’d, besides divers new
Qualities which I am not now willing to take notice of, with a strong smell
very much other than that of Vinager, and a piercing tast quite differing both
from the Sowerness of the Spirit of Vinager, and the Sweetness of the Sugar
of Lead.
To be short, As the difference of Bodies may depend meerly upon that of
the schemes whereinto their Common matter is put; So the seeds of Things,
the Fire and the other Agents are able to alter the minute parts of a Body
(either by breaking them into smaller ones of differing shapes, or by
Uniting together these Fragments with the unbroken Corpuscles, or such
Corpuscles among Themselves) and the same Agents partly by Altering the
shape or bigness of the Constituent Corpuscles of a Body, partly by driving
away some of them, partly by blending others with them, and partly by
some new manner of connecting them, may give the whole portion of
matter a new Texture of its minute parts; and thereby make it deserve a new
and Distinct name. So that according as the small parts of matter recede
from each other, or work upon each other, or are connected together after
this or that determinate manner, a Body of this or that denomination is
produced, as some other Body happens thereby to be alter’d or destroy’d.
Since then those things which Chymists produce by the help of the Fire are
but inanimate Bodies; since such fruits of the Chymists skill differ from one
another but in so few qualities that we see plainly that by fire and other
Agents we can employ, we can easily enough work as great alterations upon
matter, as those that are requisite to change one of these Chymical
Productions into another; Since the same portion of matter may without
being Compounded with any extraneous Body, or at least Element, be made
to put on such a variety of formes, and consequently to be (successively)
turn’d into so many differing Bodies. And since the matter cloath’d with so
many differing formes was originally but water, and that in its passage
thorow so many transformations, it was never reduc’d into any of those
substances which are reputed to be the Principles or Elements of mixt

Bodies, except by the violence of the fire, which it self divides not Bodies
into perfectly simple or Elementary substances, but into new Compounds;
Since, I say, these things are so, I see not why we must needs believe that
there are any Primogeneal and simple Bodies, of which as of Pre-exsistent
Elements Nature is obliged to compound all others. Nor do I see why we
may not conceive that she may produce the Bodies accounted mixt out of
one another by Variously altering and contriving their minute parts, without
resolving the matter into any such simple or Homogeneous substances as
are pretended. Neither, to dispatch, do I see why it should be counted
absur’d to think, that when a Body is resolv’d by the Fire into its suppos’d
simple Ingredients, those substances are not true and proper Elements, but
rather were, as it were, Accidentally produc’d by the fire, which by
Dissipating a Body into minute Parts does, if those parts be shut up in Close
Vessels, for the most part necessarily bring them to Associate Themselves
after another manner than before, and so bring Them into Bodies of such
Different Consistences as the Former Texture of the Body, and Concurrent
Circumstances make such disbanded particles apt to Constitute; as
experience shews us (and I have both noted it, and prov’d it already) that as
there are some Concretes whose parts when dissipated by fire are fitted to
be put into such Schemes of matter as we call Oyle, and Salt, and Spirit; So
there are others, such as are especially the greatest part of Minerals, whose
Corpuscles being of another Size or figure, or perhaps contriv’d another
Way, will not in the Fire yield Bodies of the like Consistences, but rather
others of differing Textures; Not to mention, that from Gold and some other
Bodies, we see not that the Fire separates any Distinct Substances at all; nor
That even those Similar Parts of Bodies which the Chymists Obtain by the
Fire, are the Elements whose names they bear, but Compound Bodies, upon
which, for their resemblance to them in consistence, or some other obvious
Quality, Chymists have been pleas’d to bestow such Appellations.

(473)

THE CONCLUSION.

T Hese last Words of Carneades being soon after follow’d by a noise
which seem’d to come from the place where the rest of the Company
was, he took it for a warning, that it was time for him to conclude or break
off his Discourse; and told his Friend; By this time I hope you see,
Eleutherius, that if Helmonts Experiments be true, it is no absurdity to
question whether that Doctrine be one, that doth not assert Any Elements in
the sence before explain’d. But because that, as divers of my Arguments
suppose the marvellous power of the Alkahest in the Analyzing of Bodies,
so the Effects ascrib’d to that power are so unparallell’d and stupendious,
that though I am not sure but that there may be such an Agent, yet little less
than αυτοψια seems requisite to make a man sure there is. And
consequently I leave it to you to judge, how farre those of my Arguments
that are built upon Alkahestical Operations are weakned by that Liquors
being Matchless; and shall therefore desire you not to think that I propose
this Paradox that rejects all Elements, as an Opinion equally probable with
the former part of my discourse. For by that, I hope, you are satisfied, that
the Arguments wont to be brought by Chymists, to prove That all Bodies
consist of either Three Principles, or Five, are far from being so strong as
those that I have employ’d to prove, that there is not any certain and
Determinate number of such Principles or Elements to be met with
Universally in all mixt Bodies. And I suppose I need not tell you, that these
Anti-Chymical Paradoxes might have been manag’d more to their
Advantage; but that having not confin’d my Curiosity to Chymical
Experiments, I who am but a young Man, and younger Chymist, can yet be
but slenderly furnished with them, in reference to so great and difficult a
Task as you impos’d upon me; Besides that, to tell you the Truth, I durst not
employ some even of the best Experiments I am acquainted with, because I
must not yet disclose them; but however, I think I may presume that what I
have hitherto Discoursed will induce you to think, that Chymists have been
much more happy in finding Experiments than the Causes of them; or in
assigning the Principles by which they may best be explain’d. And indeed,

when in the writings of Paracelsus I meet with such Phantastick and Un-
intelligible Discourses as that Writer often puzzels and tyres his Reader
with, father’d upon such excellent Experiments, as though he seldom
clearly teaches, I often find he knew; me thinks the Chymists, in their
searches after truth, are not unlike the Navigators of Solomons Tarshish
Fleet, who brought home from their long and tedious Voyages, not only
Gold, and Silver, and Ivory, but Apes and Peacocks too; For so the Writings
of several (for I say not, all) of your Hermetick Philosophers present us,
together with divers Substantial and noble Experiments, Theories, which
either like Peacocks feathers make a great shew, but are neither solid nor
useful; or else like Apes, if they have some appearance of being rational, are
blemish’d with some absurdity or other, that when they are Attentively
consider’d, makes them appear Ridiculous.
Carneades having thus finish’d his Discourse against the received
Doctrines of the Elements; Eleutherius judging he should not have time to
say much to him before their separation, made some haste to tell him; I
confess, Carneades, that you have said more in favour of your Paradoxes
then I expected. For though divers of the Experiments you have mention’d
are no secrets, and were not unknown to me, yet besides that you have
added many of your own unto them, you have laid them together in such a
way, and apply’d them to such purposes, and made such Deductions From
them, as I have not Hitherto met with.
But though I be therefore inclin’d to think, that Philoponus, had he heard
you, would scarce have been able in all points to defend the Chymical
Hypothesis against the arguments wherewith you have oppos’d it; yet me
thinks that however your Objections seem to evince a great part of what
they pretend to, yet they evince it not all; and the numerous tryals of those
you call the vulgar Chymists, may be allow’d to prove something too.
Wherefore, if it be granted you that you have made it probable,
First, that the differing substances into which mixt Bodies are wont to be
resolved by the Fire are not of a pure and an Elementary nature, especially
for this Reason, that they yet retain so much of the nature of the Concrete
that afforded them, as to appear to be yet somewhat compounded, and

oftentimes to differ in one Concrete from Principles of the same
denomination in another:
Next, that as to the number of these differing substances, neither is it
precisely three, because in most Vegetable and Animal bodies Earth and
Phlegme are also to be found among their Ingredients; nor is there any one
determinate number into which the Fire (as it is wont to be employ’d) does
precisely and universally resolve all compound Bodies whatsoever, as well
Minerals as others that are reputed perfectly mixt.
Lastly, that there are divers Qualities which cannot well be refer’d to any of
these Substances, as if they primarily resided in it and belong’d to it; and
some other qualities, which though they seem to have their chief and most
ordinary residence in some one of these Principles or Elements of mixt
Bodies, are not yet so deducible from it, but that also some more general
Principles must be taken in to explicate them.
If, I say, the Chymists (continues Eleutherius) be so Liberall as to make you
these three Concessions, I hope you will, on your part, be so civil and
Equitable as to grant them these three other propositions, namely;
First, that divers Mineral Bodies, and therefore probably all the rest, may be
resolv’d into a Saline, a Sulphureous, and a Mercurial part; And that almost
all Vegetable and Animal Concretes may, if not by the Fire alone, yet, by a
skilfull Artist Employing the Fire as his chief Instrument, be divided into
five differing Substances, Salt, Spirit, Oyle, Phlegme and Earth; of which
the three former by reason of their being so much more Operative than the
Two Later, deserve to be Lookt upon as the Three active Principles, and by
way of Eminence to be call’d the three principles of mixt bodies.
Next, that these Principles, Though they be not perfectly Devoid of all
Mixture, yet may without inconvenience be stil’d the Elements of
Compounded bodies, and bear the Names of those Substances which they
most Resemble, and which are manifestly predominant in them; and that
especially for this reason, that none of these Elements is Divisible by the
Fire into Four or Five differing substances, like the Concrete whence it was
separated.

Lastly, That Divers of the Qualities of a mixt Body, and especially the
Medical Virtues, do for the most part lodge in some One or Other of its
principles, and may Therefore usefully be sought for in That Principle
sever’d from the others.
And in this also (pursues Eleutherius) methinks both you and the Chymists
may easily agree, that the surest way is to Learn by particular Experiments,
what differing parts particular Bodies do consist of, and by what wayes
(either Actual or potential fire) they may best and most Conveniently be
Separated, as without relying too much upon the Fire alone, for the
resolving of Bodies, so without fruitlessly contending to force them into
more Elements than Nature made Them up of, or strip the sever’d
Principles so naked, as by making Them Exquisitely Elementary to make
them almost useless,
These things (subjoynes Eleu.) I propose, without despairing to see them
granted by you; not only because I know that you so much preferr the
Reputation of Candor before that of subtility, that your having once
suppos’d a truth would not hinder you from imbracing it when clearly made
out to you; but because, upon the present occasion, it will be no
disparagement to you to recede from some of your Paradoxes, since the
nature and occasion of your past Discourse did not oblige you to declare
your own opinions, but only to personate an Antagonist of the Chymists. So
that (concludes he, with a smile) you may now by granting what I propose,
add the Reputation of Loving the truth sincerely to that of having been able
to oppose it subtilly.
Carneades’s haste forbidding him to answer this crafty piece of flattery; Till
I shal (sayes he) have an opportunity to acquaint you with my own
Opinions about the controversies I have been discoursing of, you will not, I
hope, expect I should declare my own sence of the Arguments I have
employ’d. Wherefore I shall only tell you thus much at present; that though
not only an acute Naturalist, but even I my self could take plausible
Exceptions at some of them; yet divers of them too are such as will not
perhaps be readily answer’d, and will Reduce my Adversaries, at least, to
alter and Reform their Hypothesis. I perceive I need not minde you that the
Objections I made against the Quaternary of Elements and Ternary of
Principles needed not to be oppos’d so much against the Doctrines

Themselves (either of which, especially the latter, may be much more
probably maintain’d than hitherto it seems to have been, by those Writers
for it I have met with) as against the unaccurateness and the
unconcludingness of the Analytical Experiments vulgarly Relyed On to
Demonstrate them.
And therefore, if either of the two examin’d Opinions, or any other Theory
of Elements, shall upon rational and Experimental grounds be clearly made
out to me; ’Tis Obliging, but not irrational, in you to Expect, that I shall not
be so farr in Love with my Disquieting Doubts, as not to be content to
change them for undoubted truths. And (concludes Carneades smiling) it
were no great disparagement for a Sceptick to confesse to you, that as
unsatisfy’d as the past discourse may have made you think me with the
Doctrines of the Peripateticks, and the Chymists, about the Elements and
Principles, I can yet so little discover what to acquiesce in, that perchance
the Enquiries of others have scarce been more unsatisfactory to me, than my
own have been to my self.
FINIS.

T He Authors constant Absence from the Presse, whilst the former
Treatise was Printing, and the Nature of the Subject it self, wherewith
ordinary Composers are not wont to be at all acquainted, will, ’tis hop’d,
procure the Readers Excuse, till the next Edition, if the Errata be somewhat
numerous, and if among them there want not some grosser mistakes, which
yet are not the only Blemishes these lines must take notice of and
acknowledg; For the Author now perceives that through the fault of those to
whom he had committed the former Treatise in loose Sheets, some Papers
that belonged to it, have altogether miscarryed. And though it have luckily
enough happen’d, for the most part, that the Omission of them does not
marr the Cohærence of the rest; yet till the next design’d Edition afford an
opportunity of inserting them, it is thought fit that the Printer give notice of
one Omission at the End of the first Dialogue; and that to these Errata there
be annex’d the ensuing sheet of Paper, that was casually lost, or forgotten
by him that should have put it into the Presse; where it ought to have been

inserted, in the 187. printed Page, at the break, betwixt the words, [Nature]
in the 13th. line, and [But] in the next line after. Though it is to be noted
here, that by the mistake of the Printer, in some Books, the number of 187 is
placed at the top of two somewhat distant pages; and in such copies the
following addition ought to be inserted in the latter of the two, as followeth.
And on this occasion I cannot but take notice, that whereas
the great Argument which the Chymists are wont to employ
to vilify Earth and Water, and make them be look’d upon as
useless and unworthy to be reckon’d among the Principles of
Mixt Bodies, is, that they are not endow’d with Specifick
Properties, but only with Elementary qualities; of which they
use to speak very sleightingly, as of qualities contemptible
and unactive: I see no sufficient Reason for this Practice of
the Chymists: For ’tis confess’d that Heat is an Elementary
Quality, and yet that an almost innumerable company of
considerable Things are perform’d by Heat, is manifest to
them that duly consider the various Phænomena wherein it
intervenes as a principall Actor; and none ought less to
ignore or distrust this Truth then a Chymist. Since almost all
the operations and Productions of his Art are performed
chiefly by the means of Heat. And as for Cold it self, upon
whose account they so despise the Earth and Water, if they
please to read in the Voyages of our English and Dutch
Navigators in Nova Zembla and other Northern Regions
what stupendious Things may be effected by Cold, they
would not perhaps think it so despicable. And not to repeat
what I lately recited to You out of Paracelsus himself, who
by the help of an intense Cold teaches to separate the
Quintessence of Wine; I will only now observe to You, that
the Conservation of the Texture of many Bodies both
animate and inanimate do’s so much depend upon the
convenient motion both of their own Fluid and Looser Parts,
and of the ambient Bodies, whether Air, Water, &c. that not
only in humane Bodies we see that the immoderate or
unseasonable coldness of the Air (especially when it finds
such Bodies overheated) do’s very frequently discompose

the Oeconomie of them, and occasion variety of Diseases;
but in the solid and durable Body of Iron it self, in which
one would not expect that suddain Cold should produce any
notable change, it may have so great an operation, that if you
take a Wire, or other slender piece of steel, and having
brought it in the fire to a white heat, You suffer it afterwards
to cool leasurely in the Air, it will when it is cold be much of
the same hardnesse it was of before: Whereas if as soon as
You remove it from the fire, you plunge it into cold water, it
will upon the sudden Refrigeration acquire a very much
greater hardness then it had before; Nay, and will become
manifestly brittle. And that you may not impute this to any
peculiar Quality in the Water, or other Liquor, or Unctuous
matter, wherein such heated steel is wont to be quenched
that it may be temper’d; I know a very skillful Tradesman,
that divers times hardens steel by suddenly cooling it in a
Body that is neither a liquor, nor so much as moist. A tryal
of that Nature I remember I have seen made. And however
by the operation that Water has upon steel quenched in it,
whether upon the Account of its coldness and moisture, or
upon that of any other of its qualities, it appears, that water
is not alwaies so inefficacious and contemptible a Body, as
our Chymists would have it passe for. And what I have said
of the Efficacy of Cold and Heat, might perhaps be easily
enough carried further by other considerations and
experiments; were it not that having been mention’d only
upon the Bye, I must not insist on it, but proceed to another
Subject.

ERRATA.

P Ag. 5. line. 6. read so qualify’d, 15. 19. Ratiocinations, 25. 15. for a, 33.
17. in a parenth. (that is no more), 51. 24. besides another Caput, 79.
10. employ, 86. 13. structure, 97. 13. Sack, ibid. 22. Sack, 104. 29. instead
of appear it, will, leg. appear, it will, 118. 20. leasure, ibid. principal, 126.
20. and till it suffer, 129. 3. leg. in parenth. (notwithstanding, &c. 131. 15.
so, 144. 15. Συγχυσις, 151. 5. nor have been resolved, 180. 25. Magistram,
185. 15. lately, 188. 15. tunned, 200. 1. intolerable, ibid. 2. in, 209. 21.
tegularum, 210. 7. distill’d from, 215. 25. dele the, 220. 1. bodies, 228. 11.
fugitive, 231. 17. instead of all lege a pound, 237. 6. Chymist, 248. 18.
Ashes off, 251. 23. Deopilative), 259. 6. it self, 269. 10. ουσια αναλογος,
ibid. αϛρων ϛοιχειω, 276. 25. make a parenth. at the words, by the, and shut
it after the words in the 27. line at all, 280. 11. Corals, 288. 6. ascribes,
294. 22. porosity, ibid. 28. noted, 296. 1. Bodies, 305. 8. (attended, 307. 12.
dele to, 308. 12. devisers, 312. 14. and, 313. 3. too, 314. 24. fugitivenesse,
333. 13. origine, ibid. 24. contrivance of, 339. 1. Nay, Barthias, 142. 3. in; I
will, 350. 26. absurd, 356. 11. Goutieres, 358. 6. antea, 360. 1.
compertissimum, ibid. 18. Joachimica, ibid. 19 graminis, ibid. 23. sua, 362.
6. Dutch account, 363. 2. diggers), ibid. 11. and 12. lin. read damp as the
Englishmen also call it, 366. 25. a height, 368. 19. in use, 370. 9. latter;
And, ibid. 24. Water; I, 377. 22. Rest, ibid. 25. know), 378. 23. after
Aggregate insert or complex, ibid. 27. dele ), ibid. 28. dele ), 379. 4. before
as begin a parenth. which ends lin. 9. at Gold, ibid. instead of Which, put
This, ibid. 12. with the word Texture should be connected the next line,
Though, and this word Though is to have put before it a parenthesis, which
is to end at the word Fluid in the 16th. line, 383. 3. Regulus Martis
Stellatus, 382. 3. Relations, ibid. 9. Chymist, 386. 29. confesse by teaching
it, 391. 8. and yet may, 392. 1. an, ibid. 12. of, 393. distinct Tasts, 397. 13.
Talck, 398. 18. Earth, 399. 18. parts, 404. 8. sal-petræ, 419. 20. after it put
in Sal.

The Publisher doth advertise the Redaer, that seeing there are divers
Experiments related in this Treatise, which the Author is not unwilling to
submit to the consideration also of Forraign Philosophers, he believes this
piece will be very soon translated into Latin.

END.

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