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]

OF THE CHEMICAL ART.

it is mercury and sulfur, and not the primary, or remote, matter: for the matter of all things is one. For as the proximate primary matter of man is the union of the seed of both parents, the man and the woman; and the proximate primary matter of metal is the union of argentum vivum quicksilver/mercury and sulfur: so also the proximate primary matter of the Elixir, or Chemical Medicine, is the union of body and spirit, to the shortening of the work itself.

If I did not see gold and silver, I would say that the mastery does not exist. But because I see them, I know the mastery is true.

They asked another philosopher what he said of the mastery of the stone: he said, By God, I will reveal it to you, and I will not deny it. Whoever takes what he ought, and mixes as he ought, and works as he ought, there will proceed from it what ought to proceed. And whoever gives that medicine to a sick person as he ought, and as much as he ought, it will bring forth what it ought. For there was no Philosopher who was wise, who would deny the mastery.

ABUHALI in his epistle On the Correct Thing, if indeed he is a different person from Avicenna, whose name was Hasen, and whose father was named Hali, whence he was called Ebenhali, that is, son of Hali. And because he had a son named Hali, he was called Abuhali, that is, father of Hali.

The same is said by Geber, book 1, chap. 11, and at the end of book 3. Rodiam, book 3 of words, chap. 4, and Albertus, book of propositions, prop. 5.

And we indeed, what nature does in a thousand thousands of years according to nature, we do that same thing artificially in a short time, such as in one day, or in one hour of a day, with proximate medicines, although they are prepared in a long time, by reducing those corrupted bodies in their mine to a clear substance and an uncorrupted mine.

The same says Geber at the end of book 3.

Let us therefore seek the tincture which fire does not corrupt, and a substance which may be mixed with liquefied things, and a consolidative, coagulative, and unifying substance, fixed over the fire, and the ingenuity to mix these together, so that they become one substance by uniting, upon which fire does not imprint, and which tincts with that which is in it of the tincture, and is mixed with that which is in it of the permissible substance, and is consolidated with that which is in it of the consolidative substance, and is fixed forever with that which is in it of the fixed substance. If, therefore, we arrive at these five things, our intention will arrive to us.

The spiritual body having been made occult is ferment by reason of entry. For the body is form, and the spirit is matter. However, all? cannot subsist without form. Thus the soul