search for the philosopher's stone. He worked incessantly among his
furnaces, retorts, and crucibles, and almost poisoned himself with
deleterious fumes. He also consulted his miraculous crystal; but the
spirits appeared not to him. He tried one Bartholomew to supply the place
of the invaluable Kelly; but he being a man of some little probity, and of
no imagination at all, the spirits would not hold any communication with
him. Dee then tried another pretender to philosophy, of the name of
Hickman, but had no better fortune. The crystal had lost its power since
the departure of its great high priest. From this quarter, then, Dee could
get no information on the stone or elixir of the alchymists, and all his
efforts to discover them by other means were not only fruitless but
expensive. He was soon reduced to great distress, and wrote piteous
letters to the queen praying relief. He represented that, after he left
England with Count Laski, the mob had pillaged his house at Mortlake,
accusing him of being a necromancer and a wizard; and had broken all his
furniture, burned his library, consisting of four thousand rare volumes,
and destroyed all the philosophical instruments and curiosities in his
museum. For this damage he claimed compensation; and furthermore stated,
that, as he had come to England by the queen's command, she ought to pay
the expenses of his journey. Elizabeth sent him small sums of money at
various times; but Dee still continuing his complaints, a commission was
appointed to inquire into his circumstances. He finally obtained a small
appointment as Chancellor of St. Paul's cathedral, which he exchanged, in
1595, for the wardenship of the college at Manchester. He remained in this
capacity till 1602 or 1603, when, his strength and intellect beginning to
fail him, he was compelled to resign. He retired to his old dwelling at
Mortlake, in a state not far removed from actual want, supporting himself
as a common fortune-teller, and being often obliged to sell or pawn his
books to procure a dinner. James I. was often applied to on his behalf,
but he refused to do any thing for him. It may be said to the discredit of
this king, that the only reward he would grant the indefatigable Stowe, in
his days of old age and want, was the royal permission to beg; but no one
will blame him for neglecting such a quack as John Dee. He died in 1608,
in the eighty-first year of his age, and was buried at Mortlake.
THE COSMOPOLITE.
Many disputes have arisen as to the real name of the alchymist who wrote
several works under the above designation. The general opinion is that he
was a Scotsman named Seton, and that by a fate very common to alchymists
who boasted too loudly of their powers of transmutation, he ended his days
miserably in a dungeon, into which he was thrown by a German potentate
until he made a million of gold to pay his ransom. By some he has been
confounded with Michael Sendivog, or Sendivogius, a Pole, a professor of
the same art, who made a great noise in Europe at the commencement of the
seventeenth century. Lenglet du Fresnoy, who is in general well informed
with respect to the alchymists, inclines to the belief that these
personages were distinct; and gives the following particulars of the
Cosmopolite, extracted from George Morhoff, in his _Epistola ad
Langelottum_, and other writers.
About the year 1600, one Jacob Haussen, a Dutch pilot, was shipwrecked on
the coast of Scotland. A gentleman, named Alexander Seton, put off in a
boat, and saved him from drowning, and afterwards entertained him
hospitably for many weeks at his house on the shore. Haussen saw that he
was addicted to the pursuits of chemistry, but no conversation on the
subject passed between them at the time. About a year and a half
afterwards, Haussen being then at home at Enkhuysen, in Holland, received
a visit from his former host. He endeavoured to repay the kindness that
had been shewn him; and so great a friendship arose between them that
Seton, on his departure, offered to make him acquainted with the great
secret of the philosopher's stone. In his presence the Scotsman transmuted
a great quantity of base metal into pure gold, and gave it him as a mark
of his esteem. Seton then took leave of his friend, and travelled into
Germany. At Dresden he made no secret of his wonderful powers, having, it
is said, performed transmutation successfully before a great assemblage of
the learned men of that city. The circumstance coming to the ears of the
Duke or Elector of Saxony, he gave orders for the arrest of the alchymist.
He caused him to be imprisoned in a high tower, and set a guard of forty
men to watch that he did not escape, and that no strangers were admitted
to his presence. The unfortunate Seton received several visits from the
elector, who used every art of persuasion to make him divulge his secret.
Seton obstinately refused either to communicate his secret, or to make any
gold for the tyrant; on which he was stretched upon the rack, to see if
the argument of torture would render him more tractable. The result was
still the same; neither hope of reward nor fear of anguish could shake
him. For several months he remained in prison, subjected alternately to a
sedative and a violent regimen, till his health broke, and he wasted away
almost to a skeleton.
There happened at that time to be in Dresden a learned Pole, named Michael
Sendivogius, who had wasted a good deal of his time and substance in the
unprofitable pursuits of alchymy. He was touched with pity for the hard
fate, and admiration for the intrepidity of Seton; and determined, if
possible, to aid him in escaping from the clutch of his oppressor. He
requested the elector's permission to see the alchymist, and obtained it
with some difficulty. He found him in a state of great wretchedness, shut
up from the light of day in a noisome dungeon, and with no better couch or
fare than those allotted to the worst of criminals. Seton listened eagerly
to the proposal of escape, and promised the generous Pole that he would
make him richer than an eastern monarch if by his means he were liberated.
Sendivogius immediately commenced operations; he sold some property which
he possessed near Cracow, and with the proceeds led a merry life at
Dresden. He gave the most elegant suppers, to which he regularly invited
the officers of the guard, and especially those who did duty at the prison
of the alchymist. He insinuated himself at last into their confidence, and
obtained free ingress to his friend as often as he pleased; pretending
that he was using his utmost endeavours to conquer his obstinacy and worm
his secret out of him. When their project was ripe, a day was fixed upon
for the grand attempt; and Sendivogius was ready with a post-chariot to
convey him with all speed into Poland. By drugging some wine which he
presented to the guards of the prison, he rendered them so drowsy that he
easily found means to scale a wall unobserved, with Seton, and effect his
escape. Seton's wife was in the chariot awaiting him, having safely in her
possession a small packet of a black powder, which was, in fact, the
philosopher's stone, or ingredient for the transmutation of iron and
copper into gold. They all arrived in safety at Cracow; but the frame of
Seton was so wasted by torture of body and starvation, to say nothing of
the anguish of mind he had endured, that he did not long survive. He died
in Cracow, in 1603 or 1604, and was buried under the cathedral church of
that city. Such is the story related of the author of the various works
which bear the name of the Cosmopolite. A list of them may be found in the
third volume of the _History of the Hermetic Philosophy_.
SENDIVOGIUS.
On the death of Seton, Sendivogius married his widow, hoping to learn from
her some of the secrets of her deceased lord in the art of transmutation.
The ounce of black powder stood him, however, in better service; for the
alchymists say, that by its means he converted great quantities of
quicksilver into the purest gold. It is also said that he performed this
experiment successfully before the Emperor Rudolph II., at Prague; and
that the emperor, to commemorate the circumstance, caused a marble tablet
to be affixed to the wall of the room in which it was performed, bearing
this inscription, "Faciat hoc quispiam alius, quod fecit Sendivogius
Polonus." M. Desnoyers, secretary to the Princess Mary of Gonzaga, Queen
of Poland, writing from Warsaw in 1651, says that he saw this tablet,
which existed at that time, and was often visited by the curious.
The after-life of Sendivogius is related in a Latin memoir of him by one
Brodowski, his steward; and is inserted by Pierre Borel in his _Treasure
of Gaulish Antiquities_. The Emperor Rudolph, according to this authority,
was so well pleased with his success, that he made him one of his
councillors of state, and invited him to fill a station in the royal
household and inhabit the palace. But Sendivogius loved his liberty, and
refused to become a courtier. He preferred to reside on his own
patrimonial estate of Gravarna, where, for many years, he exercised a
princely hospitality. His philosophic powder, which, his steward says, was
red, and not black, he kept in a little box of gold; and with one grain of
it he could make five hundred ducats, or a thousand rix-dollars. He
generally made his projection upon quicksilver. When he travelled, he gave
this box to his steward, who hung it round his neck by a gold chain next
his skin. But the greatest part of the powder he used to hide in a secret
place cut into the step of his chariot. He thought that, if attacked at
any time by robbers, they would not search such a place as that. When he
anticipated any danger, he would dress himself in his valet's clothes,
and, mounting the coach-box, put the valet inside. He was induced to take
these precautions, because it was no secret that he possessed the
philosopher's stone; and many unprincipled adventurers were on the watch
for an opportunity to plunder him. A German prince, whose name Brodowski
has not thought fit to chronicle, served him a scurvy trick, which ever
afterwards put him on his guard. This prince went on his knees to
Sendivogius, and entreated him in the most pressing terms to satisfy his
curiosity, by converting some quicksilver into gold before him.
Sendivogius, wearied by his importunity, consented, upon a promise of
inviolable secrecy. After his departure, the prince called a German
alchymist, named Muhlenfels, who resided in his house, and told him all
that had been done. Muhlenfels entreated that he might have a dozen
mounted horsemen at his command, that he might instantly ride after the
philosopher, and either rob him of all his powder, or force from him the
secret of making it. The prince desired nothing better; Muhlenfels, being
provided with twelve men well mounted and armed, pursued Sendivogius in
hot haste. He came up with him at a lonely inn by the road-side, just as
he was sitting down to dinner. He at first endeavoured to persuade him to
divulge the secret; but finding this of no avail, he caused his
accomplices to strip the unfortunate Sendivogius and tie him naked to one
of the pillars of the house. He then took from him his golden box,
containing a small quantity of the powder; a manuscript book on the
philosopher's stone; a golden medal, with its chain, presented to him by
the Emperor Rudolph; and a rich cap, ornamented with diamonds, of the
value of one hundred thousand rix-dollars. With this booty he decamped,
leaving Sendivogius still naked and firmly bound to the pillar. His
servants had been treated in a similar manner; but the people of the inn
released them all as soon as the robbers were out of sight.
Sendivogius proceeded to Prague, and made his complaint to the emperor. An
express was instantly sent off to the prince, with orders that he should
deliver up Muhlenfels and all his plunder. The prince, fearful of the
emperor's wrath, caused three large gallows to be erected in his
court-yard; on the highest of which he hanged Muhlenfels, with another
thief on each side of him. He thus propitiated the emperor, and got rid of
an ugly witness against himself. He sent back, at the same time, the
bejewelled hat, the medal and chain, and the treatise upon the
philosopher's stone, which had been stolen from Sendivogius. As regarded
the powder, he said he had not seen it, and knew nothing about it.
This adventure made Sendivogius more prudent; he would no longer perform
the process of transmutation before any strangers, however highly
recommended. He pretended also to be very poor; and sometimes lay in bed
for weeks together, that people might believe he was suffering from some
dangerous malady, and could not therefore, by any possibility, be the
owner of the philosopher's stone. He would occasionally coin false money,
and pass it off as gold; preferring to be esteemed a cheat rather than a
successful alchymist.
Many other extraordinary tales are told of this personage by his steward
Brodowski, but they are not worth repeating. He died in 1636, aged upwards
of eighty, and was buried in his own chapel at Gravarna. Several works
upon alchymy have been published under his name.
THE ROSICRUCIANS.
It was during the time of the last-mentioned author that the sect of the
Rosicrucians first began to create a sensation in Europe. The influence
which they exercised upon opinion during their brief career, and the
permanent impression which they have left upon European literature, claim
for them especial notice. Before their time, alchymy was but a grovelling
delusion; and theirs is the merit of having spiritualised and refined it.
They also enlarged its sphere, and supposed the possession of the
philosopher's stone to be, not only the means of wealth, but of health and
happiness, and the instrument by which man could command the services of
superior beings, control the elements to his will, defy the obstructions
of time and space, and acquire the most intimate knowledge of all the
secrets of the universe. Wild and visionary as they were, they were not
without their uses; if it were only for having purged the superstitions of
Europe of the dark and disgusting forms with which the monks had peopled
it, and substituted, in their stead, a race of mild, graceful, and
beneficent beings.
They are said to have derived their name from Christian Rosencreutz, or
"Rose-cross," a German philosopher, who travelled in the Holy Land towards
the close of the fourteenth century. While dangerously ill at a place
called Damcar, he was visited by some learned Arabs, who claimed him as
their brother in science, and unfolded to him, by inspiration, all the
secrets of his past life, both of thought and of action. They restored him
to health by means of the philosopher's stone, and afterwards instructed
him in all their mysteries. He returned to Europe in 1401, being then only
twenty-three years of age; and drew a chosen number of his friends around
him, whom he initiated into the new science, and bound by solemn oaths to
keep it secret for a century. He is said to have lived eighty-three years
after this period, and to have died in 1484.
Many have denied the existence of such a personage as Rosencreutz, and
have fixed the origin of this sect at a much later epoch. The first
dawning of it, they say, is to be found in the theories of Paracelsus and
the dreams of Dr. Dee, who, without intending it, became the actual,
though never the recognised founders of the Rosicrucian philosophy. It is
now difficult, and indeed impossible, to determine whether Dee and
Paracelsus obtained their ideas from the then obscure and unknown
Rosicrucians, or whether the Rosicrucians did but follow and improve upon
them. Certain it is, that their existence was never suspected till the
year 1605, when they began to excite attention in Germany. No sooner were
their doctrines promulgated, than all the visionaries, Paracelsists, and
alchymists, flocked around their standard, and vaunted Rosencreutz as the
new regenerator of the human race. Michael Mayer, a celebrated physician
of that day, and who had impaired his health and wasted his fortune in
searching for the philosopher's stone, drew up a report of the tenets and
ordinances of the new fraternity, which was published at Cologne, in the
year 1615. They asserted, in the first place, "that the meditations of
their founders surpassed every thing that had ever been imagined since the
creation of the world, without even excepting the revelations of the
Deity; that they were destined to accomplish the general peace and
regeneration of man before the end of the world arrived; that they
possessed all wisdom and piety in a supreme degree; that they possessed
all the graces of nature, and could distribute them among the rest of
mankind according to their pleasure; that they were subject to neither
hunger, nor thirst, nor disease, nor old age, nor to any other
inconvenience of nature; that they knew by inspiration, and at the first
glance, every one who was worthy to be admitted into their society; that
they had the same knowledge then which they would have possessed if they
had lived from the beginning of the world, and had been always acquiring
it; that they had a volume in which they could read all that ever was or
ever would be written in other books till the end of time; that they could
force to, and retain in their service the most powerful spirits and
demons; that, by the virtue of their songs, they could attract pearls and
precious stones from the depths of the sea or the bowels of the earth;
that God had covered them with a thick cloud, by means of which they could
shelter themselves from the malignity of their enemies, and that they
could thus render themselves invisible from all eyes; that the first eight
brethren of the 'Rose-cross' had power to cure all maladies; that, by
means of the fraternity, the triple diadem of the pope would be reduced
into dust; that they only admitted two sacraments, with the ceremonies of
the primitive Church, renewed by them; that they recognised the Fourth
Monarchy and the Emperor of the Romans as their chief and the chief of all
Christians; that they would provide him with more gold, their treasures
being inexhaustible, than the King of Spain had ever drawn from the golden
regions of Eastern and Western Ind." This was their confession of faith.
Their rules of conduct were six in number, and as follow:
First. That, in their travels, they should gratuitously cure all diseases.
Secondly. That they should always dress in conformity to the fashion of
the country in which they resided.
Thirdly. That they should, once every year, meet together in the place
appointed by the fraternity, or send in writing an available excuse.
Fourthly. That every brother, whenever he felt inclined to die, should
choose a person worthy to succeed him.
Fifthly. That the words "Rose-cross" should be the marks by which they
should recognise each other.
Sixthly. That their fraternity should be kept secret for six times twenty
years.
They asserted that these laws had been found inscribed in a golden book in
the tomb of Rosencreutz, and that the six times twenty years from his
death expired in 1604. They were consequently called upon from that time
forth to promulgate their doctrine for the welfare of mankind[44].
[44] The following legend of the tomb of Rosencreutz, written by
Eustace Budgell, appears in No. 379 of the _Spectator_:--"A
certain person, having occasion to dig somewhat deep in the
ground where this philosopher lay interred, met with a small
door, having a wall on each side of it. His curiosity, and
the hope of finding some hidden treasure, soon prompted him
to force open the door. He was immediately surprised by a
sudden blaze of light, and discovered a very fair vault. At
the upper end of it was a statue of a man in armour, sitting
by a table, and leaning on his left arm. He held a truncheon
in his right hand, and had a lamp burning before him. The man
had no sooner set one foot within the vault, than the statue,
erecting itself from its leaning posture, stood bolt upright;
and, upon the fellow's advancing another step, lifted up the
truncheon in his right hand. The man still ventured a third
step; when the statue, with a furious blow, broke the lamp
into a thousand pieces, and left his guest in sudden
darkness. Upon the report of this adventure, the country
people came with lights to the sepulchre, and discovered that
the statue, which was made of brass, was nothing more than a
piece of clock-work; that the floor of the vault was all
loose, and underlaid with several springs, which, upon any
man's entering, naturally produced that which had happened.
"Rosicreucius, say his disciples, made use of this method to
shew the world that he had re-invented the ever-burning lamps
of the ancients, though he was resolved no one should reap
any advantage from the discovery."
For eight years these enthusiasts made converts in Germany, but they
excited little or no attention in other parts of Europe. At last they made
their appearance in Paris, and threw all the learned, all the credulous,
and all the lovers of the marvellous into commotion. In the beginning of
March 1623, the good folks of that city, when they arose one morning, were
surprised to find all their walls placarded with the following singular
manifesto:
"_We, the deputies of the principal College of the Brethren of the
Rose-cross, have taken up our abode, visible and invisible, in this city,
by the grace of the Most High, towards whom are turned the hearts of the
just. We shew and teach without books or signs, and speak all sorts of
languages in the countries where we dwell, to draw mankind, our fellows,
from error and from death_."
For a long time this strange placard was the sole topic of conversation in
all public places. Some few wondered, but the greater number only laughed
at it. In the course of a few weeks two books were published, which raised
the first alarm respecting this mysterious society, whose dwelling-place
no one knew, and no members of which had ever been seen. The first was
called a history of _The frightful Compacts entered into between the Devil
and the pretended 'Invisibles;' with their damnable Instructions, the
deplorable Ruin of their Disciples, and their miserable end_. The other
was called an _Examination of the new and unknown Cabala of the Brethren
of the Rose-cross, who have lately inhabited the City of Paris; with the
History of their Manners, the Wonders worked by them, and many other
particulars_.
These books sold rapidly. Every one was anxious to know something of this
dreadful and secret brotherhood. The _badauds_ of Paris were so alarmed
that they daily expected to see the arch-enemy walking _in propria
persona_ among them. It was said in these volumes that the Rosicrucian
society consisted of six-and-thirty persons in all, who had renounced
their baptism and hope of resurrection. That it was not by means of good
angels, as they pretended, that they worked their prodigies; but that it
was the devil who gave them power to transport themselves from one end of
the world to the other with the rapidity of thought; to speak all
languages; to have their purses always full of money, however much they
might spend; to be invisible, and penetrate into the most secret places,
in spite of fastenings of bolts and bars; and to be able to tell the past
and future. These thirty-six brethren were divided into bands or
companies: six of them only had been sent on the mission to Paris, six to
Italy, six to Spain, six to Germany, four to Sweden, and two into
Switzerland, two into Flanders, two into Lorraine, and two into Franche
Comté. It was generally believed that the missionaries to France resided
somewhere in the Marais du Temple. That quarter of Paris soon acquired a
bad name, and people were afraid to take houses in it, lest they should be
turned out by the six invisibles of the Rose-cross. It was believed by the
populace, and by many others whose education should have taught them
better, that persons of a mysterious aspect used to visit the inns and
hotels of Paris, and eat of the best meats and drink of the best wines,
and then suddenly melt away into thin air when the landlord came with the
reckoning. That gentle maidens, who went to bed alone, often awoke in the
night and found men in bed with them, of shape more beautiful than the
Grecian Apollo, who immediately became invisible when an alarm was raised.
It was also said that many persons found large heaps of gold in their
houses without knowing from whence they came. All Paris was in alarm. No
man thought himself secure of his goods, no maiden of her virginity, or
wife of her chastity, while these Rosicrucians were abroad. In the midst
of the commotion, a second placard was issued to the following effect:
"_If any one desires to see the brethren of the Rose-cross from curiosity
only, he will never communicate with us. But if his_ will _really induces
him to inscribe his name in the register of our brotherhood, we, who can
judge of the thoughts of all men, will convince him of the truth of our
promises. For this reason we do not publish to the world the place of our
abode. Thought alone, in unison with the sincere_ will _of those who
desire to know us, is sufficient to make us known to them, and them to
us._"