THE DELUSIONS OF ALCHEMY.
Origin of Alchemy--Argument for Transmutation--Golden
Age of Alchemy--Alchemists in the 13th century--Medals
metaphorically described--Jargon of Dr. Dee--The Green
Lion--Roger Bacon--Invention of Gunpowder--Imprisonment
of Alchemists--Edict of Henry VI.--Pope John XXII.--Pope
Sixtus V.--Alchemy applied to Medicine--Paracelsus--Evelyn’s
hesitation about Alchemy--Narrative of Helvetius--Philadept
on Alchemy--Rosicrucians--A Vision--Hayden’s description of
Rosicrucians--Dr. Price--Mr. Woulfe--Mr. Kellerman.
The subject of Alchemy occupies so large a space in the humiliating
history of the misapplication of talent, as to justify a particular
inquiry into the causes of its origin, the grounds of its success, and
the reason of its gradual decline. So much mysticism and fondness for
ambiguity exist in the writings of the hermetic philosophers, as they
were called, that it will not be surprising to find accounts of the
origin of the science wrapped in equally extraordinary language.
To begin with Adam: he is said to have foreseen the deluge, and, for
the purpose of providing against that catastrophe, to have erected
two tables of stone, which contained the foundation of this wisdom.
One of them, after the flood, was found on Mount Ararat. Alchemy has
as frequently been called the hermetic art, as it is more generally
supposed to have been invented by Hermes, King of Egypt, and master
of this science, when Egypt was the garden of God. According to
chronologers, his era was before that of Moses. This was the true
philosopher’s stone, which so enriched that kingdom, and by means of
which all the arts flourished; but in quest of which so many persons
of all nations and ages have since fruitlessly consumed both their
fortunes and lives. Unlike their baffled successors, the Egyptians
increased their wealth to that immense degree, that they studied means
how to expend their exuberant stores in the erection of pyramids,
obelisks, colossuses, monuments, pensile gardens, cities, and the
labyrinth, and in forming the immense lake Mœris, and the like
stupendous works, which cost so many millions of talents. “All these
(say the believers in the science) are sufficient arguments of their
skill in alchemy, whence they received so vast a supply of riches;
for, since no authors mention any gold mines in the time of Osiris, or
Hermes, whence could they have acquired such exceeding great wealth,
but from the chemical art of transmuting metals?”
The Egyptian priests, under a promise of secrecy, communicated the
knowledge they possessed to the Alexandrian Greeks. The actual
possession of much lucrative knowledge, and the reputation of still
more valuable secrets, would attract the notice of the credulous
and ignorant. With many the extent of the science was confined to
the refining of metals, and preparations of chemical compounds; but
the theoretical alchemist having in view a certain mysterious and
unattainable object, despised the occupation of the mere chemist, and
from policy, or want of clear ideas on the subject, the language of his
art became more and more obscure. Knaves and impostors crept in, and,
by impositions on the unwary and credulous, indemnified themselves for
the ill success of their experiments.
Those chemists who assumed the pompous title of alchemists, were
persuaded that all metals were no other than nature’s rude unfinished
essays towards the making of gold; which, by means of due coction in
the bowels of the earth, advanced gradually towards maturity, till at
last they were perfected into that beautiful metal. Their endeavours,
therefore, were to finish what nature had begun, by procuring for
the imperfect metals this much-desired coction; and upon this grand
principle all their processes were dependent.
The golden age of alchemy commenced, properly speaking, with the
conquests of Arabian fanaticism in Asia and Africa, about the time
of the destruction of the Alexandrian Library, and the subjection
of Europe to the basest superstition. The Saracens, lively, subtle,
and credulous, intimate with the fables of talismans and celestial
influences, admitted, with eager faith, the wonders of alchemy. The
rage of making gold spread through the whole Mahometan world; and in
the splendid courts of Almansor and Haroun Al Raschid, the professors
of the hermetic art found patronage, disciples, and emolument.
About the thirteenth century, Albertus Magnus, Roger Bacon, and Raymond
Lully, appeared as the revivers of this science, which had been nearly
lost in the interval from the tenth century; their writings again
raised alchemy to a very high degree of credit, and their adventures
as well as those of their disciples partake more of the character
of oriental romance than the results of philosophic study. The most
celebrated of the alchemic philosophers were not only the companions of
princes, but many of them were even kings themselves, who chose this
royal road to wealth and magnificence.
No delusion in the world ever excited so extensive and long-continued
an interest, or rather it might be called madness; though it now seems
wonderful how the fallacy of it should have escaped detection during
a period of seven or eight hundred years, when so many causes for
suspicion and disappointment must have occurred amongst its professors;
but the fond idea seems to have been strengthened by this want of
success, which was attributed to any cause rather than the proper one.
An alchemist, in his writings, complains of the difficulties attending
the search after the Immortal Dissolvent, as the grand agent in the
operations was sometimes called; and very feelingly asserts, that the
principal one is the want of subsistence or money, as without a supply
of the latter to buy glasses, build furnaces, etc., the operations
cannot go on.
The several metals were described metaphorically, as plants, animals,
&c., and mystical allusions were made to the sacred Scriptures,
in confirmation of the truth of the science, by the most forced
interpretations of certain passages: as for instance--“He struck the
stone and water poured out, and he poured oil out of the flinty rock;”
and the whole composition of the philosopher’s stone was thought to
be contained in the four verses, beginning, “He stretched forth the
heavens as a curtain, the waters stood above the mountains.”
The descriptions of the several necessary processes partook of such
figurative language, as none but the adepts could possibly understand.
Dr. Dee, in the fulness of his wisdom, thus instructs his disciples:
“The contemplative order of the Rosie-cross have presented to the world
angels, spirits, plants, and metals, with the times in astromancy
and geomancy to prepare and unite them telesmatically. This is the
substance which at present in our study is the child of the sun and
moon, placed between two fires, and in the darkest night receives a
light from the stars and retains it. The angels and intelligences are
attracted by a horrible emptiness, and attend the astrolasms for ever.
He hath in him a thick fire, by which he captivates the thin genii.
That you may know the Rosicrusian philosophy, endeavour to know God
himself, the worker of all things; now I will demonstrate in what
thing, of what thing, and by what thing, is the medicine or multiplier
of metals to be made It is even in the nature, of the nature, and by
the nature, of metals; for it is a principle of all philosophy that
Nature cannot be bettered but in her own nature. Common gold and silver
are dead, and except they be renewed by art, that is, except their
seeds, which are naturally included in them, be projected into their
natural earth, by which means they are mortified and revived, like as
the grain of wheat that is dead.” This is somewhat worse than what Mr.
Burke denominated a gipsy jargon.
The powder of transmutation, the grand means of projection, was to be
got at by the following process, in which it was typified as the Green
Lion: “In the Green Lion’s bed the sun and moon are born, they are
married, and beget a king; the king feeds on the lion’s blood, which is
the king’s father and mother, who are, at the same time, his brother
and sister. I fear I betray the secret, which I promised my master to
conceal in dark speech from every one who does not know how to rule
the philosopher’s fire.” One would imagine, in the present day, that
there was very little fear of being accused of too rashly divulging the
important secret by such explanations. Our ancestors must have had a
much greater talent than we have for finding out enigmas, if they were
able to elicit a meaning from these mystical, or rather nonsensical,
sentences.
Roger Bacon was the first English alchemist. He was born in 1214.
Popular belief attributed to him the contrivance of a machine to rise
in the air, and convey a chariot more speedily than by horses; and also
the art of putting statues in motion, and drawing articulate sounds
from brazen heads. From this it appears that he had made considerable
progress in the formation of automata. There can be no doubt that he
discovered the mode of making gunpowder; in his works the secret may be
found, veiled under an anagram. The discovery has, however, on doubtful
authority, been ascribed to Berthold Schwartz, a German Benedictine
friar, who lived about the middle of the fourteenth century. In an
old print, the _merit_ of the invention is ascribed to the devil, who
is represented as prompting the friar’s operations, and enjoying their
success.
Can we be surprised, that in an age of ignorance, the wonderful doings
of Bacon obtained for him the name of a magician, and the friars of
his own order refused to admit his works into their library, as though
he was a man who ought to be proscribed by society? His persecution
increased till 1278, when he was imprisoned, and obliged to own that he
repented of the pains he had taken in the arts and sciences; and he was
at last constrained to abandon the house of his order.
The credulity and avarice of princes often caused them to arrest
alchemists, and, by means of the torture, endeavour to force them to
multiply gold, or furnish the powder of projection, that it might
be ready for use at any time; but it was generally found that, like
poetical composition, perfect freedom of thought and action were
necessary to so desirable an end.
There is an edict of Henry VI. king of England, in letters patent to
lords, nobles, doctors, professors, and priests, to engage them in the
pursuit of the philosopher’s stone, especially the priests, who having
power (says the pious king) to convert bread and wine into the body and
blood of Christ, may well convert an impure into a perfect metal.
Even Pope John XXII., the father of the church, was weak enough to
become an adept; he worked at the practice of hermetic philosophy in
Avignon, and at his death were found eighteen millions of florins in
gold, and seven millions in jewels and sacred vases. Notwithstanding
his writing a treatise on alchemy, and making transmutations, yet such
was the mischief arising in his times from the knavery of pretended
alchemists, that he issued a bull, condemning all traders in this
science as impostors.
Pope Sixtus V. had a true idea of the real value of this science; for,
when one presented to him a book on alchemy, his holiness gave the
author an empty purse, emblematic of the vanity of the study.
In the fifteenth century this science was applied to medical uses,
and the preparations of mercury, antimony, and other metals, were
used with the happiest success. The unexpected success which attended
the first exhibition of chemical preparations awakened a new hope in
the minds of the alchemists, which was no less than the discovery of
a universal medicine, an elixir vitæ, for conferring immortality and
perpetual youth and health. Paracelsus and Van Helmont entertained
these visionary speculations; and the hopes of possessing a universal
solvent long haunted the imaginations of writers on chemistry.
Paracelsus was born in 1494; he practised physic in Basle, and the
following circumstance induced him to leave it. A canon was in extreme
sickness, and the physicians forsook him, as incurable: Paracelsus
saw him, and promised to restore him to health. The canon expressed
himself gratefully, as one who would feel the obligation, and make
him a suitable recompense. Two pills performed the cure; which was no
sooner effected, than the canon undervalued it, and contended against
the claim of the doctor: he had been _cured too soon_. The magistrates
were applied to, and they awarded Paracelsus a very moderate fee,
proportioned to his short attendance; so, in disgust, he quitted
the city, and declared that he would leave the inhabitants of Basle
to the eternal destruction which they deserved. He then retired to
Strasburg, and thence into Hungary, where he took to drinking; he died
in great poverty, at Saltzburg, in 1541. Oporinus, who served him as
his pupil, said he often saw him in great want, borrowing money of
carmen and porters, and the next day he would repay them double from a
fund that could not be discovered. His proper name was Philip Aureolus
Theophrastus Paracelsus Bombastus, of Hohenheim; and his disciples
add, “Prince of Physicians, Philosopher of Fire, the Trismegistus of
Switzerland, Reformer of Alchemistical Philosophy, Nature’s faithful
Secretary, Master of the Elixir of Life, and Philosopher’s Stone, Great
Monarch of Chemical Secrets.”
The ingenious Mr. Evelyn, both a sensible and learned man, seems
to have been unwilling to deny the truth of what had so often been
asserted to him; in his entertaining “Diary,” he says, “June 4th, 1705,
the season very dry and hot; I went to see Dr. Dickenson, the famous
chymist; we had a long conversation about the philosopher’s elixir,
which he believed attainable, and himself had seen it performed, by
one who went under the name of Mundanus, who sometimes came among the
adepts, but was unknown as to his country or abode. The doctor has
written a treatise in Latin, full of astonishing relations; he is a
very learned man, formerly of St John’s, Oxford, where he practised
physic.”
Being in Paris, Mr. Evelyn visited Marc Antonio, an ingenious
enameller, who told him two or three stories of men who had the great
arcanum, and who had successfully made projection before him several
times. “This,” says Evelyn, who obviously hesitated between doubt and
belief, “Antonio asserted with great obtestation; nor know I what to
think of it, there are so many impostors, and people who love to tell
strange stories, as this artist did; who had been a great rover, and
spake ten different languages.”
The most celebrated history of transmutation is that given by
Helvetius, in his “Brief of the Golden Calf.” It is thus given by
Mr. Brande. “The 27th day of December, 1666, came a stranger to my
house at the Hague, in a plebeick habit, of honest gravity and serious
authority, of a mean stature, and a little long face, black hair not
at all curled, a beardless chin, and about forty-four years of age,
and born in North Holland. After salutation, he beseeched me, with
great reverence, to pardon his rude access, for he was a lover of the
pyrotechnian art, and having read my treatise against the sympathetic
powder of Sir Kenelm Digby, and observed my doubt about the philosophic
mystery, induced him to ask me if I really was a disbeliever as to the
existence of an universal medicine, which would cure all diseases,
unless the principal parts were perished, or the predestinated time
of death come. I replied, I never met with an adept, or saw such a
medicine, though I had fervently prayed for it. Then I said, ‘Surely,
you are a learned physician.’ ‘No,’ said he, ‘I am a brass-founder,
and a lover of chemistry.’ He then took from his bosom-pouch a neat
ivory box, and out of it three ponderous lumps of stone, each about
the bigness of a walnut. I greedily saw and handled this most noble
substance, the value of which might be somewhere about twenty tons
of gold; and having drawn from the owner many rare secrets of its
admirable effects, I returned him this treasure of treasures with a
most sorrowful mind, humbly beseeching him to bestow a fragment of it
upon me, in perpetual memory of him, though but the size of a coriander
seed. ‘No, no,’ said he, ‘that is not lawful, though thou wouldest give
me as many golden ducats as would fill this room; for it would have
particular consequences, and if fire could be burned of fire, I would
at this instant rather cast it into the fiercest flames.’ He then asked
if I had a private chamber, whose prospect was from the public street;
so I presently conducted him to my best furnished room backwards,
which he entered, (said Helvetius, in the true spirit of Dutch
cleanliness,) without wiping his shoes, which were full of snow and
dirt. I now expected he would bestow some great secret upon me, but in
vain. He asked for a piece of gold, and opening his doublet, showed me
five pieces of that precious metal, which he wore upon a green riband,
and which very much excelled mine in flexibility and colour, each being
the size of a small trencher. I now earnestly again craved a crumb of
the stone, and at last, out of his philosophical commiseration, he gave
me a morsel as large as a rape-seed, but I said, ‘This scanty portion
will scarcely transmute four grains of lead.’ ‘Then,’ said he, ‘deliver
it me back;’ which I did, in hopes of a greater parcel; but he, cutting
off half with his nail, said, ‘Even this is sufficient for thee.’
‘Sir,’ said I, with a dejected countenance, ‘what means this?’ And he
said, ‘Even that will transmute half an ounce of lead.’ So I gave him
great thanks, and said, ‘I would try it, and reveal it to no one.’ He
then took his leave, and said he would call again next morning at nine.
I then confessed, that while the mass of his medicine was in my hand
the day before, I had secretly scraped off a bit with my nail, which
I projected in lead, but it caused no transmutation, for the whole
flew away in fumes. ‘Friend,’ said he, ‘thou art more dexterous in
committing theft, than in applying medicine. Hadst thou wrapped up thy
stolen prey in yellow wax, it would have penetrated, and transmuted the
lead into gold.’ I then asked, if the philosophic work cost much, or
required long time, for philosophers say, that nine or ten months are
required for it. He answered, ‘Their writings are only to be understood
by the adepts, without whom no student can prepare this magistery.
Fling not away, therefore, thy money and goods in hunting out this art,
for thou shalt never find it.’ To which I replied, ‘As thy master
showed it thee, so mayest thou, perchance, discover something thereof
to me, who know the rudiments, and therefore it may be easier to add
to a foundation than begin anew.’ ‘In this art,’ said he, ‘it is quite
otherwise; for, unless thou knowest the thing from head to heel, thou
canst not break open the glassy seal of Hermes. But enough: to-morrow,
at the ninth hour, I will show thee the manner of projection.’ But
Elias never came again; so my wife, who was curious in the art whereof
the worthy man had discovered, teased me to make the experiment with
the little spark of bounty the artist had left. So I melted half
an ounce of lead, upon which, my wife put in the said medicine; it
hissed and bubbled, and in a quarter of an hour the mass of lead was
transmuted into fine gold, at which we were exceedingly amazed. I
took it to the goldsmith, who judged it most excellent, and willingly
offered fifty florins for each ounce.”
The accumulated disappointments of several centuries, in the
prosecution of this science or discovery, did not eradicate the belief
in its practicability; and, so late as the year 1698, one, humbly
styling himself Philadept, wrote a book concerning adepts, not proving
that they did exist, but leaving the _onus probandi_ to those who were
sceptical on the subject. Indeed, it was a generally received opinion,
in the seventeenth century, that the philosopher’s stone did really
exist; and the gravity and sincerity of the authors who discoursed of
it, prove this. Philadept says, “It is evidently unreasonable to assert
or deny any thing without reason; no man can give any good reason,
importing that there is no such thing as the philosopher’s stone. On
the contrary, there are many reasons to believe there is such a thing.
There is a tradition of it in the world: there are many books on that
subject, written by men that show an extraordinary gravity, sincerity,
and fear of God, and who solemnly and sacredly protest they have
wrought it with their own hands; and, besides, they have, at several
times, shown the effects of it before divers witnesses, whereof there
are too many instances to reject this proof. Then, they lay down
principles which appear rational to any one that considers them. There
have been, also, too many great cures performed by philosophers, to be
reasonably questioned by them who _are_ acquainted with those matters.
Those that _are not_, ought not, in reason, to determine against
it. My intention is not to dispute about the principles of hermetic
philosophy, they have been established by many authors beyond dispute,
but most clearly and invincibly by the learned Gasto Claveus of any I
know.”
Passages in Scripture, as has been stated above, were often brought
forward in corroboration of the theory of alchemy, and it resulted,
in the course of time, that a religious sect arose, who blended the
mysteries of the Christian religion with the several processes of
alchemy towards the grand regeneration of metals; a species of allegory
understood and to be interpreted only by the disciples of that order,
known by the name of Rosie Cross; its symbol being four red roses
arranged in a crucial form.
In later times there have been a few believers in transmutation. In
the year 1782, Dr. Price, of Guildford, by means of a white and red
powder, professed to convert mercury into silver and gold; and he is
said to have convinced many disbelievers of the possibility of such
a change. His experiments were repeated seven times before learned
and intelligent persons, who themselves furnished all the materials
except the powders, which were to operate the transmutation. These
powders were in very small quantity. By whatever means it may have been
accomplished, it is certain that gold and silver were produced. But,
admitting that, with respect to its production, Price was an impostor,
it is indubitable that he must have been in possession of one valuable
secret, that of fixing mercury, so as not to evaporate in a red heat.
Price published an account of these experiments, but stated that he had
expended the whole of his powder, and that he could not obtain more,
except by a tedious process, which had already injured his health, and
which, therefore, he would not repeat. He died in the following year,
and his death was attributed to his having swallowed laurel-water, in
order to evade further scrutiny and the detection of his imposture. The
fact of his having poisoned himself is at least doubtful.
Another true believer in the mysteries of this art, says Mr. Brande,
was Peter Woulfe. He occupied chambers in Barnard’s Inn, when he
resided in London. His rooms, which were extensive, were so filled with
furnaces and apparatus, that it was difficult to reach his fireside. A
gentleman once put down his hat, and never could find it again, such
was the confusion of boxes, packages, and parcels, that lay about the
chamber. Woulfe had long vainly searched for the elixir, and attributed
his repeated failures to the want of due preparation by pious and
charitable acts. Some of his apparatus is said to have been extant
since his death, upon which are supplications for success, and for the
welfare of the adepts. He had an heroic remedy for illness: when he
felt himself seriously indisposed, he took a place in the Edinburgh
mail, and, having reached that city, immediately came back in the
returning coach to London. He died in 1805.
The last of the English alchemists seems to have been a gentleman of
the name of Kellerman, who, as lately as 1828, was living at Lilley,
a village between Luton and Hitchin. He was a singular character,
who shunned all society, carried six loaded pistols in his pockets,
barricaded his house, and filled his ground with spring-guns. The
interior of his dilapidated mansion was a complete chaos. He pretended
to have discovered the universal solvent, the art of fixing mercury,
and the powder of projection. With the last of these he had, he said,
made gold, and could make as much as he pleased. He kept eight men
for the purpose of superintending his crucibles, two at a time being
employed, who were relieved every six hours. He had one characteristic
of a disturbed intellect, that of believing that all the world was in a
confederacy against him, and that there was a conspiracy to assassinate
him.