Theatrum chemicum, praecipuos selectorum auctorum tractatus de chemiae et lapidis philosophici antiquitate, veritate, iure, praestantia, & operationibus, continens: in gratiam verae chemiae, et medicinae chemicae studiosorum ... congestum, et in sex partes seu volumina digestum; singulis voluminibus, suo auctorum et librorum catalogo primis pagellis: rerum vero & verborum indice postremis annexo. Volumen primum [- sextum]

The Same.

Avicenna. Ar. v. & sulph. is the matter of all things.

Metalla transmutari possunt unum in aliud, cum naturalia sint, & ipsorum materia eadem. Metals can be transmuted one into another, since they are natural, and their matter is the same.

The Same, in another place.

Charissime fili, non abhorreas super nomine lapidis. Nullus enim unquam potuit, nec in posterum poterit tingere aurum, nisi cum auro. O charissimi divinæ artis filij, declinate ab omni errore cæcitatis, & attendite veritatem consistere tantum in tribus, ex quibus componitur verum philosophorum Elixir, videlicet ex lapide lunari, in quo sulphur est album, ex lapide solari, in quo est sulphur rubeum; & lapis Mercurij amplectitur utrumque, quod album scilicet & rubeum. Dearest son, do not be repulsed by the name of the stone. For no one has ever been able, nor will anyone hereafter be able, to tinge gold except with gold. O dearest sons of the divine art, turn away from every error of blindness, and note that the truth consists only in three things, from which the true Elixir of the philosophers is composed, namely, the lunar stone, in which the sulphur is white; the solar stone, in which the sulphur is red; and the stone of Mercury embraces both, namely, the white and the red.

William of Paris.

Intentio philosophorum est facere de corpore spiritum, scilicet argentum vivum purum, quod dicitur philosophicum. Cum autem oporteat componere lapidem ex duabus substantiis, volatilis & fixa, necesse est prius ex unione illarum conficere eorum argentum vivum, antequam fiat Elixir completum. The intention of the philosophers is to make spirit from body, namely, pure quicksilver, which is called philosophical. But since it is necessary to compose the stone from two substances, volatile and fixed, it is necessary first to make their quicksilver from the union of those, before the complete Elixir is made.

Jo. Duns Scotus, the Subtle Doctor.

Aliqui dicunt, bonum esse mutare materiam de uno vase in aliud interdum, quod verum non est. Sed sufficit lapidem semel poni in vase suo bene clauso, nec inde egredi, quousque totum compleatur magisterium: & quod amplius est, à malo est, ut in generatione hominis, & omnis vegetalis, nunquam nisi semel matrici imponitur semen. Some say it is good to change the matter from one vessel to another sometimes, which is not true. But it is enough for the stone to be placed once in its well-closed vessel, and not to leave it until the whole work is completed; and what is more than this is from evil, as in the generation of man, and every vegetable, the seed is never placed in the womb but once.

Vincent the Monk, book 5 of Natural things.

Noë hanc Philosophorum medicinam tenebat, & quingentesimum annum agens generavit Sem, Cham, & Iaphet. Noah held this medicine of the philosophers, and at five hundred years of age, he begat Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

Præterea Arnaldus de Villa nova in quodam tractatu loquens de putrefactione, & mutatione materiæ lapidis in varios colores, citat locum illum Joëlis Prophetæ, ubi ait, Solem converti in tenebras, & lunam in sanguinem. Et Joan. Dastinus Anglus lib. 3. Obscuratus est sol in ortu suo, & luna à suo lumine declinavit. Furthermore, Arnaldus de Villa Nova, in a certain treatise speaking of putrefaction and the change of the matter of the stone into various colors, cites that passage of the Prophet Joel, where he says, The sun shall be turned into darkness and the moon into blood. And John Dastin the Englishman, book 3, The sun was obscured in its rising, and the moon declined from its light.

RAYMUNDUS Lullius, Book of the Codicil, chapter 53.

Facimus tamen gratia gratis data per immortalem hominem, nostram secretam dissolutionem intra novem dies mediocriter intellectam, cum non sit transitus à prima ad tertiam, nisi per istam, quæ media est inter hanc & illam. Hoc enim est secretum à mortali nemine revelandum. Yet we perform, by grace freely given through the immortal man, our secret dissolution within nine days, moderately understood, since there is no transition from the first to the third, except through this one, which is the middle between this and that. For this is a secret to be revealed by no mortal.

CHRYSOGONUS Polydorus, or Osiander, as some wish.

The Jews say that the Prince of Tyre, according to Ezekiel, practiced Alchemy, and therefore the prophet reproached him, because by the confidence of that art, he seemed to himself to be God. For the Prophet (as they say) relates that the gold and silver which he had in his treasuries, he had not dug from the earth, had not exacted from his subjects, nor had he snatched from his enemies, but had made for himself, relying on this art: and therefore that Daniel was wiser, and had perused all the secrets of nature, when he said to them under the person of God: Multiplicavi eis argentum & ipsi fecerunt idolo suo aurum. I have multiplied silver for them, and they have made gold for their idol.