Chemical Investigation of the Difference Between Philosophical and Mineral Antimony, as well as Philosophical and Common Mercury

(9)

mony of the philosophers is perfected by cooking alone and acquires such perfection that it can perfect other imperfect things with its own perfection. Therefore, the philosophers' antimony and common antimony differ not in matter, because they have one and the same, but in quality. For the matter of the philosophers' antimony is altered by varied and manifold alteration, which alteration and disposition is indeed not found in common and ordinary antimony, since it has not been dissolved again from its moisture, from which it is composed, and through this dissolution, it has not been cleared of its filthy excrements in which it abounds. If this were done, I believe it could undergo the same alteration and become philosophers' antimony.