The Foundation

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the perfecte corpus perfect body which is of its own nature. For that same water is related and pleasing to the metals. It makes the gold white because it has a white mercury within itself. From this, you can truly grasp a great secret: namely, that the water of Saturnine antimony must be mercurial and white so that it makes the gold white. It is not burning, but dissolving, and afterwards it runs together as a white, thick juice. Therefore the Philosophus Philosopher says that this same water makes the corpus body volatile. This is because after it has been dissolved in this water and become cold again, it rises up above the water.

He says: Now take the raw, leafed, or thin-beaten gold, or that which is calciniret calcined, or burned to powder through mercury, and put it into our antimonial, Saturnine, mercurial vinegar and Sal armoniac salt ammoniac, as it is called, in a wide glass vessel that is four fingers high or slightly more. Let it stand in tempered heat, and in a short time you will see it rise like a moist oil and swim on top like a thin skin. Collect this with a spoon or by dipping a feather into it. Collect it in this way several different times a day until nothing more rises. Let the water evaporate by the fire, that is, the remaining moisture of the vinegar. Then the Quinta Essentia Fifth Essence of the gold will remain for you as a white, incombustible oil, in