Since then those things which Chymists produce by the help of the Fire are but inanimate Bodies; since such fruits of the Chymists skill differ from one another but in so few qualities that we see plainly that by fire and other Agents we can employ, we can easily enough work as great alterations upon matter, as those that are requisite to change one of these Chymical Productions into another; Since the same portion of matter may without being Compounded with any extraneous Body, or at least Element, be made to put on such a variety of formes, and consequently to be (successively) turn’d into so many differing Bodies. And since the matter cloath’d with so many differing formes was originally but water, and that in its passage thorow so many transformations, it was never reduc’d into any of those substances which are reputed to be the Principles or Elements of mixt Bodies, except by the violence of the fire, which it self divides not Bodies into perfectly simple or Elementary substances, but into new Compounds; Since, I say, these things are so, I see not why we must needs believe that there are any Primogeneal and simple Bodies, of which as of Pre-exsistent Elements Nature is obliged to compound all others. Nor do I see why we may not conceive that she may produce the Bodies accounted mixt out of one another by Variously altering and contriving their minute parts, without resolving the matter into any such simple or Homogeneous substances as are pretended. Neither, to dispatch, do I see why it should be countedabsur’dto think, that when a Body is resolv’d by the Fire into its suppos’d simple Ingredients, those substances are not true andproper Elements, but rather were, as it were, Accidentally produc’d by the fire, which by Dissipating a Body into minute Parts does, if those parts be shut up in Close Vessels, for the most part necessarily bring them to Associate Themselves after another manner than before, and so bring Them into Bodies of such Different Consistences as the Former Texture of the Body, and Concurrent Circumstances make such disbanded particles apt to Constitute; as experience shews us (and I have both noted it, and prov’d it already) that as there are some Concretes whose parts when dissipated by fire are fitted to be put into such Schemes of matter as we call Oyle, and Salt, and Spirit; So there are others, such as are especially the greatest part of Minerals, whose Corpuscles being of another Size or figure, or perhaps contriv’d another Way, will not in the Fire yield Bodies of the like Consistences, but rather others of differing Textures; Not to mention, that from Gold and some other Bodies, we see not that the Fire separates any Distinct Substances at all; nor That even those Similar Parts ofBodies which the Chymists Obtain by the Fire, are the Elements whose names they bear, but Compound Bodies, upon which, for their resemblance to them in consistence, or some other obvious Quality, Chymists have been pleas’d to bestow such Appellations.
(473)
THese last Words ofCarneadesbeing soon after follow’d by a noise which seem’d to come from the place where the rest of the Company was, he took it for a warning, that it was time for him to conclude or break off his Discourse; and told his Friend; By this time I hope you see,Eleutherius, that ifHelmontsExperiments be true, it is no absurdity to question whether that Doctrine be one, that doth not assert Any Elements in the sence before explain’d. But because that, as divers of my Arguments suppose the marvellous power of theAlkahestin the Analyzing of Bodies, so the Effects ascrib’d to that power are so unparallell’d and stupendious,that though I am not sure but that theremay besuch an Agent, yet little less thanαυτοψιαseems requisite to make a man sure thereis. And consequently I leave it to you to judge, how farre those of my Arguments that are built uponAlkahesticalOperations are weakned by that Liquors being Matchless; and shall therefore desire you not to think that I propose this Paradox that rejects all Elements, as an Opinion equally probable with the former part of my discourse. For by that, I hope, you are satisfied, that the Arguments wont to be brought by Chymists, to prove That all Bodies consist of either Three Principles, or Five, are far from being so strong as those that I have employ’d to prove, that there is not any certain and Determinate number of such Principles or Elements to be met with Universally in all mixt Bodies. And I suppose I need not tell you, that theseAnti-ChymicalParadoxes might have been manag’d more to their Advantage; but that having not confin’d my Curiosity to Chymical Experiments, I who am but a young Man, and younger Chymist, can yet be but slenderly furnished withthem, in reference to so great and difficult a Task as you impos’d upon me; Besides that, to tell you the Truth, I durst not employ some even of the best Experiments I am acquainted with, because I must not yet disclose them; but however, I think I may presume that what I have hitherto Discoursed will induce you to think, that Chymists have been much more happy in finding Experiments than the Causes of them; or in assigning the Principles by which they may best be explain’d. And indeed, when in the writings ofParacelsusI meet with such Phantastick and Un-intelligible Discourses as that Writer often puzzels and tyres his Reader with, father’d upon such excellent Experiments, as though he seldom clearly teaches, I often find he knew; me thinks the Chymists, in their searches after truth, are not unlike the Navigators ofSolomons TarshishFleet, who brought home from their long and tedious Voyages, not only Gold, and Silver, and Ivory, but Apes and Peacocks too; For so the Writings of several (for I say not, all) of your Hermetick Philosophers present us, together with divers Substantial andnoble Experiments, Theories, which either like Peacocks feathers make a great shew, but are neither solid nor useful; or else like Apes, if they have some appearance of being rational, are blemish’d with some absurdity or other, that when they areAttentivelyconsider’d, makes them appear Ridiculous.
Carneadeshaving thus finish’d his Discourse against the received Doctrines of theElements;Eleutheriusjudging he should not have time to say much to him before their separation, made some haste to tell him; I confess,Carneades, that you have said more in favour of your Paradoxes then I expected. For though divers of the Experiments you have mention’d are no secrets, and were not unknown to me, yet besides that you have added many of your own unto them, you have laid them together in such a way, and apply’d them to such purposes, and made such Deductions From them, as I have not Hitherto met with.
But though I be therefore inclin’d to think, thatPhiloponus, had he heard you, would scarce have been able in allpoints to defend the ChymicalHypothesisagainst the arguments wherewith you have oppos’d it; yet me thinks that however your Objections seem to evince a great part of what they pretend to, yet they evince it not all; and the numerous tryals of those you call the vulgar Chymists, may be allow’d to prove something too.
Wherefore, if it be granted you that you have made it probable,
First, that the differing substances into which mixt Bodies are wont to be resolved by the Fire are not of a pure and an Elementary nature, especially for this Reason, that they yet retain so much of the nature of the Concrete that afforded them, as to appear to be yet somewhat compounded, and oftentimes to differ in one Concrete from Principles of the same denomination in another:
Next, that as to the number of these differing substances, neither is it precisely three, because in most Vegetable and Animal bodies Earth and Phlegme are also to be found among their Ingredients; nor is there any one determinate number into which the Fire (as it iswont to be employ’d) does precisely and universally resolve all compound Bodies whatsoever, as well Minerals as others that are reputed perfectly mixt.
Lastly, that there are divers Qualities which cannot well be refer’d to any of these Substances, as if they primarily resided in it and belong’d to it; and some other qualities, which though they seem to have their chief and most ordinary residence in some one of these Principles or Elements of mixt Bodies, are not yet so deducible from it, but that also some more general Principles must be taken in to explicate them.
If, I say, the Chymists (continuesEleutherius) be so Liberall as to make you these three Concessions, I hope you will, on your part, be so civil and Equitable as to grant them these three other propositions, namely;
First, that divers Mineral Bodies, and therefore probably all the rest, may be resolv’d into a Saline, a Sulphureous, and a Mercurial part; And that almost all Vegetable and Animal Concretes may, if not by the Fire alone, yet, by a skilfull Artist Employing the Fire ashis chief Instrument, be divided into five differing Substances, Salt, Spirit, Oyle, Phlegme and Earth; of which the three former by reason of their being so much more Operative than the Two Later, deserve to be Lookt upon as the Three active Principles, and by way of Eminence to be call’d the three principles of mixt bodies.
Next, that these Principles, Though they be not perfectly Devoid of all Mixture, yet may without inconvenience be stil’d the Elements of Compounded bodies, and bear the Names of those Substances which they most Resemble, and which are manifestly predominant in them; and that especially for this reason, that none of these Elements is Divisible by the Fire into Four or Five differing substances, like the Concrete whence it was separated.
Lastly, That Divers of the Qualities of a mixt Body, and especially the Medical Virtues, do for the most part lodge in some One or Other of its principles, and may Therefore usefully be sought for in That Principle sever’d from the others.
And in this also (pursuesEleutherius)methinks both you and the Chymists may easily agree, that the surest way is to Learn by particular Experiments, what differing parts particular Bodies do consist of, and by what wayes (either Actual or potential fire) they may best and most Conveniently be Separated, as without relying too much upon the Fire alone, for the resolving of Bodies, so without fruitlessly contending to force them into more Elements than Nature made Them up of, or strip the sever’d Principles so naked, as by making Them Exquisitely Elementary to make them almost useless,
These things (subjoynesEleu.) I propose, without despairing to see them granted by you; not only because I know that you so much preferr the Reputation ofCandorbefore that of subtility, that your having once suppos’d a truth would not hinder you from imbracing it when clearly made out to you; but because, upon the present occasion, it will be no disparagement to you to recede from some of your Paradoxes, since the nature and occasion of your past Discourse did not oblige you to declare your own opinions, but only to personate an Antagonist ofthe Chymists. So that (concludes he, with a smile) you may now by granting what I propose, add the Reputation of Loving the truth sincerely to that of having been able to oppose it subtilly.
Carneades’shaste forbidding him to answer this crafty piece of flattery; Till I shal (sayes he) have an opportunity to acquaint you with my own Opinions about the controversies I have been discoursing of, you will not, I hope, expect I should declare my own sence of the Arguments I have employ’d. Wherefore I shall only tell you thus much at present; that though not only an acute Naturalist, but even I my self could take plausible Exceptions at some of them; yet divers of them too are such as will not perhaps be readily answer’d, and will Reduce my Adversaries, at least, to alter and Reform theirHypothesis. I perceive I need not minde you that the Objections I made against the Quaternary of Elements and Ternary of Principles needed not to be oppos’d so much against the Doctrines Themselves (either of which, especially the latter, may be much more probably maintain’d than hitherto it seems tohave been, by those Writers for it I have met with) as against the unaccurateness and the unconcludingness of theAnalyticalExperiments vulgarly Relyed On to Demonstrate them.
And therefore, if either of the two examin’d Opinions, or any other Theory of Elements, shall upon rational and Experimental grounds be clearly made out to me; ’Tis Obliging, but not irrational, in you to Expect, that I shall not be so farr in Love with my Disquieting Doubts, as not to be content to change them for undoubted truths. And (concludesCarneadessmiling) it were no great disparagement for a Sceptick to confesse to you, that as unsatisfy’d as the past discourse may have made you think me with the Doctrines of the Peripateticks, and the Chymists, about the Elements and Principles, I can yet so little discover what to acquiesce in, that perchance the Enquiries of others have scarce been more unsatisfactory to me, than my own have been to my self.
FINIS.
THe Authors constant Absence from the Presse, whilst the former Treatise was Printing, and the Nature of the Subject it self, wherewith ordinary Composers are not wont to be at all acquainted, will, ’tis hop’d, procure the Readers Excuse, till the next Edition, if theErratabe somewhat numerous, and if among them there want not some grosser mistakes, which yet are not the only Blemishes these lines must take notice of and acknowledg; For the Author now perceives that through the fault of those to whom he had committed the former Treatise in loose Sheets, some Papers that belonged to it, have altogether miscarryed. And though it have luckily enough happen’d, for the most part, that the Omission of them does not marr the Cohærence of the rest; yet till the next design’d Edition afford anopportunityof inserting them, it is thought fit that the Printer give notice of one Omission at the End of the first Dialogue; and that to theseErratathere be annex’d the ensuing sheet of Paper, that was casually lost, or forgotten by him that should have put it into the Presse;where it ought to have been inserted, in the187.printed Page, at the break, betwixt the words, [Nature] in the 13th. line, and [But] in the next line after. Though it is to be noted here, that by the mistake of the Printer, in some Books, the number of 187 is placed at the top of two somewhat distant pages; and in such copies the following addition ought to be inserted in the latter of the two, as followeth.
And on this occasion I cannot but take notice, that whereas the great Argument which the Chymists are wont to employ to vilify Earth and Water, and make them be look’d upon as useless and unworthy to be reckon’d among the Principles of Mixt Bodies, is, that they are not endow’d with Specifick Properties, but only with Elementary qualities; of which they use to speak very sleightingly, as of qualities contemptible and unactive: I see no sufficient Reason for this Practice of the Chymists: For ’tis confess’d that Heat is an Elementary Quality, and yet that an almost innumerable company of considerable Things are perform’d by Heat, is manifest tothem that duly consider the variousPhænomenawherein it intervenes as a principall Actor; and none ought less to ignore or distrust this Truth then a Chymist. Since almost all the operations and Productions of his Art are performed chiefly by the means of Heat. And as for Cold it self, upon whose account they so despise the Earth and Water, if they please to read in the Voyages of our English and Dutch Navigators inNova Zemblaand other Northern Regions what stupendious Things may be effected by Cold, they would not perhaps think it so despicable. And not to repeat what I lately recited to You out ofParacelsushimself, who by the help of an intense Cold teaches to separate the Quintessence of Wine; I will only now observe to You, that the Conservation of the Texture of many Bodies both animate and inanimate do’s so much depend upon the convenient motion both of their own Fluid and Looser Parts, and of the ambient Bodies, whether Air, Water, &c. that not only in humane Bodies we see that the immoderate or unseasonable coldness of the Air (especially when it finds such Bodies overheated) do’s very frequently discompose theOeconomieof them, and occasion variety of Diseases; but in the solid and durable Body of Iron it self, in which one would not expect that suddain Cold should produce any notable change, it may have so great an operation, that if you take a Wire, or other slender piece of steel, and having brought it in the fire to a white heat, You suffer it afterwards to cool leasurely in the Air, it will when it is cold be much of the same hardnesse it was of before: Whereas if as soon as You remove it from the fire, you plunge it into cold water, it will upon the sudden Refrigeration acquire a very much greater hardness then it had before; Nay, and will become manifestly brittle. And that you may not impute this to any peculiar Quality in the Water, or other Liquor, or Unctuous matter, wherein such heated steel is wont to be quenched that it may be temper’d; I know a very skillful Tradesman, that divers times hardens steel by suddenly cooling it in a Body that is neither a liquor, nor so much as moist. A tryal of that Nature I remember I have seen made. And however by the operation that Water hasupon steel quenched in it, whether upon the Account of its coldness and moisture, or upon that of any other of its qualities, it appears, that water is not alwaies so inefficacious and contemptible a Body, as our Chymists would have it passe for. And what I have said of the Efficacy of Cold and Heat, might perhaps be easily enough carried further by other considerations and experiments; were it not that having been mention’d only upon the Bye, I must not insist on it, but proceed to another Subject.
And on this occasion I cannot but take notice, that whereas the great Argument which the Chymists are wont to employ to vilify Earth and Water, and make them be look’d upon as useless and unworthy to be reckon’d among the Principles of Mixt Bodies, is, that they are not endow’d with Specifick Properties, but only with Elementary qualities; of which they use to speak very sleightingly, as of qualities contemptible and unactive: I see no sufficient Reason for this Practice of the Chymists: For ’tis confess’d that Heat is an Elementary Quality, and yet that an almost innumerable company of considerable Things are perform’d by Heat, is manifest tothem that duly consider the variousPhænomenawherein it intervenes as a principall Actor; and none ought less to ignore or distrust this Truth then a Chymist. Since almost all the operations and Productions of his Art are performed chiefly by the means of Heat. And as for Cold it self, upon whose account they so despise the Earth and Water, if they please to read in the Voyages of our English and Dutch Navigators inNova Zemblaand other Northern Regions what stupendious Things may be effected by Cold, they would not perhaps think it so despicable. And not to repeat what I lately recited to You out ofParacelsushimself, who by the help of an intense Cold teaches to separate the Quintessence of Wine; I will only now observe to You, that the Conservation of the Texture of many Bodies both animate and inanimate do’s so much depend upon the convenient motion both of their own Fluid and Looser Parts, and of the ambient Bodies, whether Air, Water, &c. that not only in humane Bodies we see that the immoderate or unseasonable coldness of the Air (especially when it finds such Bodies overheated) do’s very frequently discompose theOeconomieof them, and occasion variety of Diseases; but in the solid and durable Body of Iron it self, in which one would not expect that suddain Cold should produce any notable change, it may have so great an operation, that if you take a Wire, or other slender piece of steel, and having brought it in the fire to a white heat, You suffer it afterwards to cool leasurely in the Air, it will when it is cold be much of the same hardnesse it was of before: Whereas if as soon as You remove it from the fire, you plunge it into cold water, it will upon the sudden Refrigeration acquire a very much greater hardness then it had before; Nay, and will become manifestly brittle. And that you may not impute this to any peculiar Quality in the Water, or other Liquor, or Unctuous matter, wherein such heated steel is wont to be quenched that it may be temper’d; I know a very skillful Tradesman, that divers times hardens steel by suddenly cooling it in a Body that is neither a liquor, nor so much as moist. A tryal of that Nature I remember I have seen made. And however by the operation that Water hasupon steel quenched in it, whether upon the Account of its coldness and moisture, or upon that of any other of its qualities, it appears, that water is not alwaies so inefficacious and contemptible a Body, as our Chymists would have it passe for. And what I have said of the Efficacy of Cold and Heat, might perhaps be easily enough carried further by other considerations and experiments; were it not that having been mention’d only upon the Bye, I must not insist on it, but proceed to another Subject.
PAg.5.line. 6. readso qualify’d,15.19.Ratiocinations,25.15.for a,33.17. in a parenth. (that is no more),51.24.besides another Caput,79.10.employ,86.13.structure,97.13.Sack, ibid. 22.Sack,104.29. instead ofappear it, will, leg.appear, it will,118.20.leasure, ibid.principal,126.20.and till it suffer,129.3. leg. in parenth. (notwithstanding, &c.131.15.so,144.15.Συγχυσις,151.5.nor have been resolved,180.25.Magistram,185.15.lately,188.15.tunned,200.1.intolerable, ibid. 2.in,209.21.tegularum,210.7.distill’d from,215.25. delethe,220.1.bodies,228.11.fugitive,231.17. instead ofalllegea pound,237.6.Chymist,248.18.Ashes off,251.23.Deopilative),259.6.it self,269.10.ουσια αναλογος,ibid.αϛρων ϛοιχειω,276.25. make a parenth. at the words,by the, and shut it after the words in the 27. lineat all,280.11.Corals,288.6.ascribes,294.22.porosity, ibid. 28.noted,296.1.Bodies,305.8.(attended,307.12. deleto,308.12.devisers,312.14.and,313.3.too,314.24.fugitivenesse,333.13.origine, ibid. 24.contrivance of,339.1.Nay, Barthias,142.3.in; I will,350.26.absurd,356.11.Goutieres,358.6.antea,360.1.compertissimum, ibid. 18.Joachimica, ibid. 19graminis, ibid. 23.sua,362.6.Dutch account,363.2.diggers), ibid. 11. and 12. lin. readdamp as the Englishmen also call it,366.25.a height,368.19.in use,370.9.latter; And, ibid. 24.Water; I,377.22.Rest, ibid. 25.know),378.23. afterAggregateinsertor complex, ibid. 27. dele ), ibid. 28. dele ),379.4. beforeasbegin a parenth. which ends lin. 9. atGold, ibid. instead ofWhich, putThis, ibid. 12. with the wordTextureshould be connected the next line,Though, and this wordThoughis to have put before it a parenthesis, which is to end at the wordFluidin the 16th. line,383.3.Regulus Martis Stellatus,382.3.Relations, ibid. 9.Chymist,386.29.confesse by teaching it,391.8.and yet may,392.1.an, ibid. 12.of,393.distinct Tasts,397.13.Talck,398.18.Earth,399.18.parts,404.8.sal-petræ,419.20. afteritput inSal.
The Publisher doth advertise theRedaer, that seeing there are divers Experiments related in this Treatise, which the Author is not unwilling to submit to the consideration also of Forraign Philosophers, he believes this piece will be very soon translated into Latin.
END.