On the Tincture of Gold or True Potable Gold

strate the truth with one or two examples: although I could demonstrate this clearly with the most certain and firmest reasons, for the sake of brevity I have now decided to omit them, recommending to the investigator of the nature and property of metals our Treatise On the Generation of Minerals, which will undoubtedly remove every scruple for him; but to the refuter of the truth, I pose two questions and reasons to be confuted. And indeed, first: from where does that increase in both quantity and quality of some viscous mineral liquor long exposed to the sun in an open glass vessel proceed? Is it from the sun or elsewhere? But you insist that this increase proceeds from the air, the vehicle of all things. To which: if it is from the air, is the air not impregnated by the sun, and is there anything in the air that it has not received from the stars?

Furthermore, place a liquid of this kind in a cold cellar or in humid air, and in reality, you will experience no increase of weight resulting from it, as you do in the sun, or its deputy, namely fire. That liquor will indeed attract some phlegmatic humidity, but it is easily separated again upon sensing heat, leaving the liquor of its former weight. That very thing can also be proved and demonstrated by the following example. Dissolve some sulphurous metal, such as iron, copper, or zinc, with any acidic spirit; then abstract the spirit; make the remainder glow, though not too much, but just enough for the total removal of the spirits; which afterward (having first ob-