that made by Edward III. in 1344. The gold used in this coinage is
supposed to have been manufactured in the Tower; the adept in question
was not Raymond Lully, but the English Ripley.
Whether the saint of Majorca was proficient in the Hermetic art or not,
it is quite certain that he did not visit the British Isles. It is also
certain that in the _Ars Magna Sciendi_, part 9, chapter on Elements,
he states that one species of metal cannot be changed into another, and
that the gold of alchemy has only the semblance of that metal; that is,
it is simply a sophistication.
As all the treatises ascribed to Raymond Lully cannot possibly be his,
and as his errant and turbulent life could have afforded him few
opportunities for the long course of experiments which are generally
involved in the search for the _magnum opus_, it is reasonable to
suppose that his alchemical writings are spurious, or that two authors,
bearing the same name, have been ignorantly confused. With regard to
“the Jewish neophyte,” referred to by the _Biographie Universelle_,
no particulars of his life are forthcoming. The whole question is
necessarily involved in uncertainty, but it is a point of no small
importance to have established for the first time the fabulous nature
of the Cremer Testament. This production was first published by Michael
Maier, in his _Tripus Aureus_, about the year 1614. The two treatises
which accompany it appear to be genuine relics of Hermetic antiquity.
* * * * *
The “Clavicula, or Little Key” of Raymond Lully is generally considered
to contain the arch secrets of alchemical adeptship; it elucidates the
other treatises of its author, and undertakes to declare the whole art
without any fiction. The transmutation of metals depends upon their
previous reduction into volatile sophic argent vive, and the only
metals worth reducing, for the attainment of this _prima materia_, are
silver and gold. This argent vive is said to be dryer, hotter, and more
digested than the common substance, but its extraction is enveloped in
mystery and symbolism, and the recipes are impossible to follow for
want of the materials so evasively and deceptively described. At the
same time, it is clear that the operations are physical, and that the
materials and objects are also physical, which points are sufficient
for our purpose, and may be easily verified by research.
Moreover, the alchemist who calls himself Raymond Lully was acquainted
with nitric acid and with its uses as a dissolvent of metals. He could
form _aqua regia_ by adding sal ammoniac, or common salt, to nitric
acid, and he was aware of its property of dissolving gold. Spirit of
wine was well known to him, says Gruelin; he strengthened it with dry
carbonate of potash, and prepared vegetable tinctures by its means.
He mentions alum from Rocca, marcasite, white and red mercurial
precipitate. He knew the volatile alkali and its coagulations by
means of alcohol. He was acquainted with cupellated silver, and first
obtained rosemary oil by distilling the plant with water.[P]
FOOTNOTES:
[K] This illness is referred to by another writer, with details of a
miraculous kind. “About 1275 (the chronology of all the biographers is
a chaos of confusion) he fell ill a second time, and was reduced to
such an extremity that he could take neither rest nor nourishment. On
the feast of the Conversion of St Paul, the crucified Saviour again
appeared to him, glorified, and surrounded by a most exquisite odour,
which surpassed musk, amber, and all other scents. In remembrance of
this miracle, on the same day, in the same bed and place where he lived
and slept, the same supernal odour is diffused.”
[L] The following variation is also related:--“Finding him still alive
when they bore him to the ship, the merchants put back towards Genoa
to get help, but they were carried miraculously to Majorca, where the
martyr expired in sight of his native island. The merchants resolved to
say nothing of their precious burden, which they embalmed and preserved
religiously, being determined to transport it to Genoa. Three times
they put to sea with a wind that seemed favourable, but as often they
were forced to return into port, which proved plainly the will of God,
and obliged them to make known the martyrdom of the man whom they
revered, who was stoned for the glory of God in the town of Bugia (?)
in the year of grace 1318.” From this account it will be seen that
the place of Lully’s violent death, as well as the date on which it
occurred, are both involved in doubt. He was born under the pontificate
of Honorius IV., and died, according to Genebrand, about 1304; but
the author of the preface to the meditations of the Hermit Blaquerne
positively fixes his decease on the feast of the martyrdom of SS. Peter
and Paul, June 29, 1315, and declares that he was eighty-six years old.
[M] _E.g._, Jean-Marie de Vernon, who extends the lists to about three
thousand, and, following the Père Pacifique de Provence, prolongs his
life by the discovery of the universal medicine.
[N] “Lives of Alchemystical Philosophers,” ed. 1815.
[O] Kenyon, “Gold Coins of England,” pp. 57, 58.
[P] Gruelin, _Geschichte der Chemie_, i. 74.
ARNOLD DE VILLANOVA.
The date and the birthplace of this celebrated adept are alike
uncertain. Catalonia, Milan, and Montpellier have been severally named
for the locality, and 1245 is, on the whole, the probable period.
Arnold studied medicine at Paris for twenty years, after which for ten
more he perambulated Italy, visiting the different universities. He
subsequently penetrated into Spain, but hearing that Peter d’Apono, his
friend, was in the hands of the Inquisition, he prudently withdrew,
and abode under the patronage of Frederick, King of Naples and Sicily,
writing his tracts on medicine and his “Comment on the School of
Salerno.” He is said to have perished in a storm during the year 1314,
but a circular letter written by Pope Clement V. in 1311 conjures
those living under his authority to discover, if possible, and send to
him, the “Treatise on Medicine,” written by Arnold, his physician, who
promised it to the Holy Father, but died before he could present it. In
this case the date of his decease may be more accurately fixed at 1310.
Arnold was, according to the custom of the period, charged with
magical practices. François Pegna declares that all his erudition in
alchemy was derived from the demon. Mariana accuses him of attempting
to create a man by means of certain drugs deposited in a pumpkin. But
he is justified by Delrio from these imputations, and the orthodox
_Dictionnaire des Sciences Occultes_ considers that Clement V. would
not have chosen an initiate of magical arts as his physician. In 1317
the Inquisition of Tarragona condemned his books to be burned, but
this was for the heretical sentiments which they contained. He wrote
strictures on the monastic state and the service of religion, and
maintained that works of divine faith and charity were more agreeable
to God than the Sacrifice of the Mass.
His skill in Hermetic philosophy has been generally recognised.
His contemporary, the celebrated Jurisconsult, John Andre, says of
him:--“In this time appeared Arnold de Villeneuve, a great theologian,
a skilful physician, and wise alchymist, who made gold, which he
submitted to all proofs.” Arnold has also the character of writing with
more light and clearness than the other philosophers. His alchemical
works were published in 1509, in one folio volume. His _Libellus de
Somniorum Interpretatione et Somnia Danielis_ is excessively rare in
its original quarto edition. Several alchemical and magical works
are gratuitously ascribed to him. Among these must be classed the
book called _De Physicis Ligaturis_, supposed to be translated from
the Arabic--_De Sigillis duodecim Signorum_, which is concerned with
the zodiacal signs--and the book of the “Three Impostors,” which the
_Dictionnaire des Sciences Occultes_ denominates “stupid and infamous.”
The _Thesaurus Thesaurorum_ and the _Rosarium Philosophorum_, the
_Speculum Alchemiæ_ and the _Perfectum Magisterium_, are the most
notable of all his alchemical treatises. To these the student should
add his _Scientia Scientiæ_ and brief _Testamentum_. The editions
are various, but the tracts will be found in collected form in the
_Bibliotheca Chemicæ Curiosa_ of J. J. Mangetus.
Arnold asserts that argent vive is the medicine of all the metals, that
vulgar sulphur is the cause of all their imperfections, that the stone
of the philosophers is one, and that it is to be extracted from that in
which it exists. It exists in all bodies, including common argent vive.
The first physical work is the dissolution of the stone in its own
mercury to reduce it to its _prima materia_. All the operations of the
_magnum opus_ are successively described, including the composition of
the white and the red elixirs, and the multiplication of the metallic
medicine.
The marcasite frequently mentioned by Arnold is thought to be identical
with bismuth. He was acquainted with the preparation of oil of
turpentine, oil of rosemary, and performed distillations in a glazed
earthen vessel with a glass top and helm.
JEAN DE MEUNG.
Poet, alchemist, and astrologer, a man of some fortune, and issued
from an ancient family, Jean de Meung was one of the chief figures
at the Court of King Philippe le Bel. He was born, according to the
latest authorities, about the middle of the thirteenth century, and
his continuation of the _Roman de la Rose_, which Guillaume de Lorris
had begun some time before the year 1260, was undertaken not in his
nineteenth year, as generally stated, but about or a little before the
age of thirty, and at the instance of the French King.
The Romance of the Rose, “that epic of ancient France,” as Éliphas
Lévi calls it, has been generally considered by alchemists a poetic
and allegorical presentation of the secrets of the _magnum opus_.
It professes, at any rate, the principles of Hermetic Philosophy,
and Jean de Meung was also the author of “Nature’s Remonstrances
to the Alchemist” and “The Alchemist’s Answer to Nature.” Hermetic
commentaries have been written upon the romance-poem, and tradition
has ascribed to the author the accomplishment of great transmutations.
The sermon of Genius, chaplain and confessor to Dame Nature, in the
Romance, is an exhibition of the principles of chemistry, as well as
a satire on the bombastic and unintelligible preaching which was in
vogue at that period. From verse 16,914 to verse 16,997 there is much
chemical information.
The year 1216 is the probable period of the poet’s death. The story
told of his testament has only a foundation in legend, but it is
worth repeating as evidence of the general belief in his skill as an
alchemist.
He chose by his will, says the story, to be buried in the Church of the
Jacobins, and, as an acknowledgment, left them a coffer that appeared,
at least by its weight, to be filled with things precious, probably
with the best gold which could be manufactured by the skill of the
Hermetists. He ordered, however, that this coffer should not be opened
till after his funeral, when, touched with the piety of the deceased,
the monks assembled in great numbers to be present at its opening, and
to offer up thanks to God. They found to their great disappointment
that the coffer was filled with large pieces of slates beautifully
engraved with figures of geometry and arithmetic. The indignation of
the fathers was excited by the posthumous imposture, and they proposed
to eject the body of Jean de Meung from their consecrated precincts;
but the Parliament being informed of this inhumanity, obliged the
Jacobins, by a decree, to leave the deceased undisturbed in the
honourable sepulchre of their conventual cloisters.
In “Nature’s Remonstrance to the Alchemist,” who is described as a
foolish and sophistical souffleur, making use of nothing but mechanical
arts, the complainant bitterly abuses the fanatical student who
diffuses over her beautiful domain the rank odours of sulphur, which
he tortures in vain over his furnaces, for by such a method he will
assuredly attain nothing. The alchemist in his “Reply” figures as a
repentant being, convinced of his errors, which he ascribes to the
barbarous allegories, parabolic sentences, and delusive precepts
contained in the writings of the adepts.
THE MONK FERARIUS.
About the beginning of the fourteenth century, this Italian artist gave
to the world two treatises--_De Lapide Philosophorum_ and _Thesaurus
Philosophiæ_, which are printed in the _Theatrum Chimicum_.
The “admirable spectacle” of the palingenesis of plants is described by
this Jesuit. “Immediately consequent on exposing to the rays of the sun
the phial, filled with quintessence of the rose, there is discovered
within the narrow compass of the vase a perfect world of miracles. The
plant which lay buried in its ashes awakes, uprises, and unfolds. In
the space of half-an-hour the vegetable phœnix is resuscitated from
its own dust. The rose issues from its sepulchre and assumes a new
life. It is the floral symbol of that resurrection by which mortals
lying in darkness and in the shadow of death will pass into beautiful
immortality.”
The treatise on the philosophical stone very pertinently remarks
that in alchemy the first thing to be ascertained is what is really
signified by the myrionimous _argentum vivum sapientum_, a point
on which the author gracefully declines information. Both works
are exceedingly obscure and vexatious. The _Thesaurus Philosophiæ_
testifies that the plain speaking of the philosophers is completely
illusory, and that it is only in their incomprehensible profundities
that we must seek the light of Hermes.
Alchemy is the science of the four elements, which are to be found
in all created substances, but are not of the vulgar kind. The whole
practice of the art is simply the conversion of these elements into
one another. The seed and matter of every metal is mercury, as it
is decocted and otherwise prepared in the bowels of the earth, and
each of them can be reduced into this _prima materia_, by the help
of which they are also, one and all, susceptible of augmentation and
multiplication, even to infinity.
POPE JOHN XXII.
This pontiff is claimed as an adept by the alchemists, a fact which
is denied, but not disproved, by his orthodox biographers. That he
believed in the power of magic is shown by the accusation which he
directed against Géraud, Bishop of Cahors, whom he accredited with
the design of poisoning him, together with the entire college of
cardinals, and with having in particular contrived sorceries and
diabolical enchantments against all of them. He was the contemporary
of Raymond Lully and Arnold de Villanova, and is said to have been the
pupil and friend of the latter. Nevertheless, the mischief occasioned
at that period by the impostures of pretended alchemists led him to
issue a bull condemning the traders in this science as charlatans who
promised what they were unable to perform. Hermetic writers assert
that this bull was not directed against veritable adepts, and his
devotion to his laboratory at Avignon seems a fairly established fact.
Franciscus Pagi, in his _Breviarum de Gestis Romanorum Pontificum_,
has the following passage:--_Joannes scripsit quoque latino sermone
artem metallorum transmutorium; quod opus prodiit Gallici incerto
translatore Lugduni, anno 1557 in 8vo_. It is allowed that he was a
writer on medicine. His _Thesaurus Pauperum_, a collection of recipes,
was printed at Lyons in 1525, and he was the author of a treatise on
diseases of the eye, and of another on the formation of the fœtus.
He was born at Cahors, according to the general opinion, of poor but
reputable parents; he showed at an early period his skill in law and
in the sciences. The circumstances of his life are exceedingly obscure
until his consecration as Bishop of Fréjus in 1300. Subsequently
he was promoted to the see of Avignon, and Clement V. created him
cardinal-bishop of Porto. He was raised to the pontificate at Lyons,
and reigned at Avignon till his death in 1334. He left behind him in
his coffers the sum of eighteen million florins in gold and seven
millions in jewels, besides valuable consecrated vessels. Alchemists
attribute these vast treasures to his skill in their science, and
assert in addition that he manufactured two hundred ingots, apparently
on a single occasion. By a calculation of one of his biographers, this
quantity of the precious metal was equivalent to £660,000, British
sterling. A treatise entitled “The Elixir of the Philosophers, or the
Transmutatory Art of Metals,” is attributed to him. It was translated
from the Latin into French, and published in duodecimo at Lyons in
1557. It is written _ad clerum_, and for this reason is probably the
more misleading. It represents the constituents of the perfect medicine
to be vinegar, salt, urine, and sal ammoniac, with the addition of an
undescribed substance called sulphur vive.
NICHOLAS FLAMEL.
The name of this alchemical adept has been profoundly venerated not
only in the memory of the Hermetists but in the hearts of the French
people, among whom he is the central figure of many marvellous legends
and traditions. “Whilst in all ages and nations the majority of
hierophants have derived little but deception, ruination, and despair
as the result of their devotion to alchemy, Nicholas Flamel enjoyed
permanent good fortune and serenity. Far from expending his resources
in the practice of the _magnum opus_, he added with singular suddenness
a vast treasure to a moderate fortune. These he employed in charitable
endowments and in pious foundations that long survived him and long
sanctified his memory. He built churches and chapels which were adorned
with statues of himself, accompanied by symbolical characters and
mysterious crosses, which subsequent adepts long strove to decipher,
that they might discover his secret history, and the kabbalistic
description of the process by which he was conducted to the realisation
of the Grand Magisterium.”
Whether Flamel was born at Paris or Pontoise is not more uncertain
than the precise date of his nativity. This occurred some time during
the reign of Philippe le Bel, the spoliator of the grand order of
the Temple, and, on the whole, the most probable year is 1330. His
parents were poor, and left him little more than the humble house
in Paris which he continued to possess till his death, and which he
eventually bequeathed to the Church. It stood in Notary Street, at the
corner of Marivaux Street, opposite the Marivaux door of the Church of
Saint-Jacques-la-Boucherie.
Authorities disagree as to the amount of education that Flamel
obtained in his youth, but it was sufficient to qualify him for
the business of a scrivener, which, in spite of his wealth and his
accredited wisdom, he continued to follow through life. He was
proficient in painting and poetry, and had a taste for architecture and
the mathematical sciences; yet he applied himself steadily to business,
and contracted a prudent marriage, his choice falling on a widow, named
Pernelle, who, though handsome, was over forty years, but who brought a
considerable dowry to her second husband.
In his capacity as a copyist before the age of printing, books of all
classes fell into the hands of Flamel, and among them were many of
those illuminated alchemical treatises which are reckoned among the
rarest treasures of mediæval manuscripts. Acquainted with the Latin
language, he insensibly accumulated an exoteric knowledge of the aims
and theories of the adepts. His interest and curiosity were awakened,
and he began studying them in his leisure moments. Now tradition
informs us that, whether his application was great, his desire intense,
or whether he was super-eminently fitted to be included by divine
election among the illuminated Sons of the Doctrine, or for whatever
other reason, the mystical Bath-Kôl appeared to him under the figure
of an angel, bearing a remarkable book bound in well-wrought copper,
the leaves of thin bark, graven right carefully with a pen of iron. An
inscription in characters of gold contained a dedication addressed to
the Jewish nation by Abraham the Jew, prince, priest, astrologer, and
philosopher.
“Flamel,” cried the radiant apparition, “behold this book of which thou
understandest nothing; to many others but thyself it would remain for
ever unintelligible, but one day thou shalt discern in its pages what
none but thyself will see!”
At these words Flamel eagerly stretched out his hands to take
possession of the priceless gift, but book and angel disappeared in an
auriferous tide of light. The scrivener awoke to be ravished henceforth
by the divine dream of alchemy; but so long a time passed without any
fulfilment of the angelic promise, that the ardour of his imagination
cooled, the great hope dwindled gradually away, and he was settling
once more into the commonplace existence of a plodding scribe, when,
on a certain day of election in the year 1357, an event occurred which
bore evidence of the veracity of his visionary promise-maker, and
exalted his ambition and aspirations to a furnace heat. This event,
with the consequences it entailed, are narrated in the last testament
of Nicholas Flamel, which begins in the following impressive manner,
but omits all reference to the legendary vision:--
“The Lord God of my life, who exalts the humble in spirit out of the
most abject dust, and makes the hearts of such as hope in Him to
rejoice, be eternally praised.
“Who, of His own grace, reveals to the believing souls the springs of
His bounty, and subjugates beneath their feet the crowns of all earthly
felicities and glories.
“In Him let us always put our confidence, in His fear let us place our
happiness, and in His mercy the hope and glory of restoration from our
fallen state.
“And in our supplications to Him let us demonstrate or show forth a
faith unfeigned and stable, an assurance that shall not for ever be
shaken.
“And Thou, O Lord God Almighty, as Thou, out of Thy infinite and most
desirable goodness, hast condescended to open the earth and unlock Thy
treasures unto me, Thy poor and unworthy servant, and hast given into
my possession the fountains and well-springs of all the treasures and
riches of this world.
“So, O Lord God, out of Thine abundant kindness, extend Thy mercies
unto me, that when I shall cease to be any longer in the land of the
living, Thou mayst open unto me the celestial riches, the divine
treasures, and give me a part or portion in the heavenly inheritance
for ever.
“Where I may behold Thy divine glory and the fulness of Thy Heavenly
Majesty, a pleasure, so ineffable, and a joy, so ravishing, which no
mortal can express or conceive.
“This I entreat of Thee, O Lord, for our Lord Jesus Christ, Thy
well-beloved Son’s sake, who in the unity of the Holy Spirit liveth
with Thee, world without end. Amen.
“I, _Nicholas Flamel_, Scrivener, living at _Paris_, anno 1399, in the
_Notary Street_, near _St James_, of the _Bouchery_, though I learned
not much Latin, because of the poorness and meanness of my parents, who
were notwithstanding (by them that envy me most) accounted honest and
good people.
“Yet, by the blessing of God, I have not wanted an understanding of the
books of the philosophers, but learned them and attained to a certain
kind of knowledge, even of their hidden secrets.
“For which cause sake there shall not any moment of my life pass,
wherein remembering this so vast a good, I will not on my bare knees,
if the place will permit of it, or otherwise in my heart, with all the
entireness of my affections, render thanks to this my most good and
precious God.
“Who never forsakes the righteous generation, or suffers the children
of the just to beg their bread, nor deceives their expectations, but
supports them with blessings who put their trust in Him.