The Story of Alchemy and the Beginnings of Chemistry Part 2

The seven princ.i.p.al planets and the seven princ.i.p.al metals were called by the same names: _Sol_ (gold), _Luna_ (silver), _Saturn_ (lead), _Jupiter_ (tin), _Mars_ (iron), _Venus_ (copper), and _Mercury_ (mercury). The author of _The New Chemical Light_ taught that one metal could be propagated from another only in the order of superiority of the planets. He placed the seven planets in the following descending order: Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Sol, Venus, Mercury, Luna. "The virtues of the planets descend," he said, "but do not ascend"; it is easy to change Mars (iron) into Venus (copper), for instance, but Venus cannot be transformed into Mars.

Although the alchemists regarded everything as influencing, and influenced by, other things, they were persuaded that the greatest effects are produced on a substance by substances of like nature with itself. Hence, most of them taught that the seed of metals will be obtained by operations with metals, not by the action on metals of things of animal or vegetable origin. Each cla.s.s of substances, they said, has a life, or spirit (an essential character, we might say) of its own. "The life of sulphur," Paracelsus said, "is a combustible, ill-smelling, fatness.... The life of gems and corals is mere colour.... The life of water is its flowing.... The life of fire is air." Grant an attraction of like to like, and the reason becomes apparent for such directions as these: "Nothing heterogeneous must be introduced into our magistery"; "Everything should be made to act on that which is like it, and then Nature will perform her duty."

Although each cla.s.s of substances was said by the alchemists to have its own particular character, or life, nevertheless they taught that there is a deep-seated likeness between all things, inasmuch as the power of _the essence_, or _the one thing_, is so great that under its influence different things are produced from the same origin, and different things are caused to pa.s.s into and become the same thing.

In _The New Chemical Light_ it is said: "While the seed of all things is one, it is made to generate a great variety of things."

It is not easy now--it could not have been easy at any time--to give clear and exact meanings to the doctrines of the alchemists, or the directions they gave for performing the operations necessary for the production of the object of their search. And the difficulty is much increased when we are told that "The Sage jealously conceals [his knowledge] from the sinner and the scornful, lest the mysteries of heaven should be laid bare to the vulgar gaze." We almost despair when an alchemical writer a.s.sures us that the Sages "Set pen to paper for the express purpose of concealing their meaning. The sense of a whole pa.s.sage is often hopelessly obscured by the addition or omission of one little word, for instance the addition of the word _not_ in the wrong place." Another writer says: "The Sages are in the habit of using words which may convey either a true or a false impression; the former to their own disciples and children, the latter to the ignorant, the foolish, and the unworthy." Sometimes, after descriptions of processes couched in strange and mystical language, the writer will add, "If you cannot perceive what you ought to understand herein, you should not devote yourself to the study of philosophy." Philalethes, in his _Brief Guide to the Celestial Ruby_, seems to feel some pity for his readers; after describing what he calls "the generic h.o.m.ogeneous water of gold," he says: "If you wish for a more particular description of our water, I am impelled by motives of charity to tell you that it is living, flexible, clear, nitid, white as snow, hot, humid, airy, vaporous, and digestive."

Alchemy began by a.s.serting that nature must be simple; it a.s.sumed that a knowledge of the plan and method of natural occurrences is to be obtained by thinking; and it used a.n.a.logy as the guide in applying this knowledge of nature's design to particular events, especially the a.n.a.logy, a.s.sumed by alchemy to exist, between material phenomena and human emotions.

CHAPTER III.

THE ALCHEMICAL CONCEPTION OF THE UNITY AND SIMPLICITY OF NATURE.

In the preceding chapter I have referred to the frequent use made by the alchemists of their supposition that nature follows the same plan, or at any rate a very similar plan, in all her processes. If this supposition is accepted, the primary business of an investigator of nature is to trace likenesses and a.n.a.logies between what seem on the surface to be dissimilar and unconnected events. As this idea, and this practice, were the foundations whereon the superstructure of alchemy was raised, I think it is important to amplify them more fully than I have done already.

Mention is made in many alchemical writings of a mythical personage named _Hermes Trismegistus_, who is said to have lived a little later than the time of Moses. Representations of Hermes Trismegistus are found on ancient Egyptian monuments. We are told that Alexander the Great found his tomb near Hebron; and that the tomb contained a slab of emerald whereon thirteen sentences were written. The eighth sentence is rendered in many alchemical books as follows:

"Ascend with the greatest sagacity from the earth to heaven, and then again descend to the earth, and unite together the powers of things superior and things inferior. Thus you will obtain the glory of the whole world, and obscurity will fly away from you."

This sentence evidently teaches the unity of things in heaven and things on earth, and a.s.serts the possibility of gaining, not merely a theoretical, but also a practical, knowledge of the essential characters of all things. Moreover, the sentence implies that this fruitful knowledge is to be obtained by examining nature, using as guide the fundamental similarity supposed to exist between things above and things beneath.

The alchemical writers constantly harp on this theme: follow nature; provided you never lose the clue, which is simplicity and similarity.

The author of _The Only Way_ (1677) beseeches his readers "to enlist under the standard of that method which proceeds in strict obedience to the teaching of nature ... in short, the method which nature herself pursues in the bowels of the earth."

The alchemists tell us not to expect much help from books and written directions. When one of them has said all he can say, he adds--"The question is whether even this book will convey any information to one before whom the writings of the Sages and the open book of Nature are exhibited in vain." Another tells his readers the only thing for them is "to beseech G.o.d to give you the real philosophical temper, and to open your eyes to the facts of nature; thus alone will you reach the coveted goal."

"Follow nature" is sound advice. But, nature was to be followed with eyes closed save to one vision, and the vision was to be seen before the following began.

The alchemists' general conception of nature led them to a.s.sign to every substance a condition or state natural to it, and wherein alone it could be said to be as it was designed to be. Each substance, they taught, could be caused to leave its natural state only by violent, or non-natural, means, and any substance which had been driven from its natural condition by violence was ready, and even eager, to return to the condition consonant with its nature.

Thus Norton, in his _Ordinal of Alchemy_, says: "Metals are generated in the earth, for above ground they are subject to rust; hence above ground is the place of corruption of metals, and of their gradual destruction. The cause which we a.s.sign to this fact is that above ground they are not in their proper element, and an unnatural position is destructive to natural objects, as we see, for instance, that fishes die when they are taken out of the water; and as it is natural for men, beasts, and birds to live in the air, so stones and metals are naturally generated under the earth."

In his _New Pearl of Great Price_ (16th century), Bonus says:--"The object of Nature in all things is to introduce into each substance the form which properly belongs to it; and this is also the design of our Art."

This view a.s.sumed the knowledge of the natural conditions of the substances wherewith experiments were performed. It supposed that man could act as a guide, to bring back to its natural condition a substance which had been removed from that condition, either by violent processes of nature, or by man's device. The alchemist regarded himself as an arbiter in questions concerning the natural condition of each substance he dealt with. He thought he could say, "this substance ought to be thus, or thus," "that substance is constrained, thwarted, hindered from becoming what nature meant it to be."

In Ben Jonson's play called _The Alchemist_, Subtle (who is the alchemist of the play) says, " ... metals would be gold if they had time."

The alchemist not only attributed ethical qualities to material things, he also became the guardian and guide of the moral practices of these things. He thought himself able to recall the erring metal to the path of metalline virtue, to lead the extravagant mineral back to the moral home-life from which it had been seduced, to show the doubting and vacillating salt what it was ignorantly seeking, and to help it to find the unrealised object of its search. The alchemist acted as a sort of conscience to the metals, minerals, salts, and other substances he submitted to the processes of his laboratory. He treated them as a wise physician might treat an ignorant and somewhat refractory patient. "I know what you want better than you do," he seems often to be saying to the metals he is calcining, separating, joining and subliming.

But the ignorant alchemist was not always thanked for his treatment.

Sometimes the patient rebelled. For instance, Michael Sendivogius, in his tract, _The New Chemical Light drawn from the Fountain of Nature and of Manual Experience_ (17th century), recounts _a dialogue between Mercury, the Alchemist, and Nature_.

"On a certain bright morning a number of Alchemists met together in a meadow, and consulted as to the best way of preparing the Philosopher's Stone.... Most of them agreed that Mercury was the first substance. Others said, no, it was sulphur, or something else.... Just as the dispute began to run high, there arose a violent wind, which dispersed the Alchemists into all the different countries of the world; and as they had arrived at no conclusion, each one went on seeking the Philosopher's Stone in his own old way, this one expecting to find it in one substance, and that in another, so that the search has continued without intermission even unto this day. One of them, however, had at least got the idea into his head that Mercury was the substance of the Stone, and determined to concentrate all his efforts on the chemical preparation of Mercury.... He took common Mercury and began to work with it. He placed it in a gla.s.s vessel over the fire, when it, of course, evaporated. So in his ignorance he struck his wife, and said: 'No one but you has entered my laboratory; you must have taken my Mercury out of the vessel.' The woman, with tears, protested her innocence. The Alchemist put some more Mercury into the vessel.... The Mercury rose to the top of the vessel in vaporous steam. Then the Alchemist was full of joy, because he remembered that the first substance of the Stone is described by the Sages as volatile; and he thought that now at last he _must_ be on the right track. He now began to subject the Mercury to all sorts of chemical processes, to sublime it, and to calcine it with all manner of things, with salts, sulphur, metals, minerals, blood, hair, aqua fortis, herbs, urine, and vinegar.... Everything he could think of was tried; but without producing the desired effect." The Alchemist then despaired; after a dream, wherein an old man came and talked with him about the "Mercury of the Sages," the Alchemist thought he would charm the Mercury, and so he used a form of incantation. The Mercury suddenly began to speak, and asked the Alchemist why he had troubled him so much, and so on. The Alchemist replied, and questioned the Mercury. The Mercury makes fun of the philosopher. Then the Alchemist again torments the Mercury by heating him with all manner of horrible things. At last Mercury calls in the aid of Nature, who soundly rates the philosopher, tells him he is grossly ignorant, and ends by saying: "The best thing you can do is to give yourself up to the king's officers, who will quickly put an end to you and your philosophy."

As long as men were fully persuaded that they knew the plan whereon the world was framed, that it was possible for them to follow exactly "the road which was followed by the Great Architect of the Universe in the creation of the world," a real knowledge of natural events was impossible; for every attempt to penetrate nature's secrets presupposed a knowledge of the essential characteristics of that which was to be investigated. But genuine knowledge begins when the investigator admits that he must learn of nature, not nature of him.

It might be truly said of one who held the alchemical conception of nature that "his foible was omniscience"; and omniscience negatives the attainment of knowledge.

The alchemical notion of a natural state as proper to each substance was vigorously combated by the Honourable Robert Boyle (born 1626, died 1691), a man of singularly clear and penetrative intellect. In _A Paradox of the Natural and Supernatural States of Bodies, Especially of the Air_, Boyle says:--"I know that not only in living, but even in inanimate, bodies, of which alone I here discourse, men have universally admitted the famous distinction between the natural and preternatural, or violent state of bodies, and do daily, without the least scruple, found upon it hypotheses and ratiocinations, as if it were most certain that what they call nature had purposely formed bodies in such a determinate state, and were always watchful that they should not by any external violence be put out of it. But notwithstanding so general a consent of men in this point, I confess, I cannot yet be satisfied about it in the sense wherein it is wont to be taken. It is not, that I believe, that there is no sense in which, or in the account upon which, a body may he said to be in its natural state; but that I think the common distinction of a natural and violent state of bodies has not been clearly explained and considerately settled, and both is not well grounded, and is oftentimes ill applied. For when I consider that whatever state a body be put into, or kept in, it obtains or retains that state, a.s.senting to the catholic laws of nature, I cannot think it fit to deny that in this sense the body proposed is in a natural state; but then, upon the same ground, it will he hard to deny but that those bodies which are said to be in a violent state may also be in a natural one, since the violence they are presumed to suffer from outward agents is likewise exercised no otherwise than according to the established laws of universal nature."

There must be something very fascinating and comforting in the alchemical view of nature, as a harmony constructed on one simple plan, which can be grasped as a whole, and also in its details, by the introspective processes of the human intellect; for that conception prevails to-day among those who have not investigated natural occurrences for themselves. The alchemical view of nature still forms the foundation of systems of ethics, of philosophy, of art. It appeals to the innate desire of man to make himself the measure of all things. It is so easy, so authoritative, apparently so satisfactory.

No amount of thinking and reasoning will ever demonstrate its falsity.

It can be conquered only by a patient, unbia.s.sed, searching examination of some limited portion of natural events.

CHAPTER IV.

THE ALCHEMICAL ELEMENTS AND PRINCIPLES.

The alchemists were sure that the intention of nature regarding metals was that they should become gold, for gold was considered to be the most perfect metal, and nature, they said, evidently strains after perfection. The alchemist found that metals were worn away, eaten through, broken, and finally caused to disappear, by many acid and acrid liquids which he prepared from mineral substances. But gold resisted the attacks of these liquids; it was not changed by heat, nor was it affected by sulphur, a substance which changed limpid, running mercury into an inert, black solid. Hence, gold was more perfect in the alchemical scale than any other metal.

Since gold was considered to be the most perfect metal, it was self-evident to the alchemical mind that nature must form gold slowly in the earth, must trans.m.u.te gradually the inferior metals into gold.

"The only thing that distinguishes one metal from another," writes an alchemist who went under the name of Philalethes, "is its degree of maturity, which is, of course, greatest in the most precious metals; the difference between gold and lead is not one of substance, but of digestion; in the baser metal the coction has not been such as to purge out its metallic impurities. If by any means this superfluous impure matter could be organically removed from the baser metals, they would become gold and silver. So miners tell us that lead has in many cases developed into silver in the bowels of the earth, and we contend that the same effect is produced in a much shorter time by means of our Art."

Stories were told about the finding of gold in deserted mines which had been worked out long before; these stories were supposed to prove that gold was bred in the earth. The facts that pieces of silver were found in tin and lead mines, and gold was found in silver mines, were adduced as proofs that, as the author of _The New Pearl of Great Price_ says, "Nature is continually at work changing other metals into gold, because, though in a certain sense they are complete in themselves, they have not yet reached the highest perfection of which they are capable, and to which nature has destined them." What nature did in the earth man could accomplish in the workshop. For is not man the crown of the world, the masterpiece of nature, the flower of the universe; was he not given dominion over all things when the world was created?

In a.s.serting that the baser metals could be trans.m.u.ted into gold, and in attempting to effect this trans.m.u.tation, the alchemist was not acting on a vague; haphazard surmise; he was pursuing a policy dictated by his conception of the order of nature; he was following the method which he conceived to be that used by nature herself. The trans.m.u.tation of metals was part and parcel of a system of natural philosophy. If this trans.m.u.tation were impossible, the alchemical scheme of things would be destroyed, the believer in the trans.m.u.tation would be left without a sense of order in the material universe. And, moreover, the alchemist's conception of an orderly material universe was so intimately connected with his ideas of morality and religion, that to disprove the possibility of the great trans.m.u.tation would be to remove not only the basis of his system of material things, but the foundations of his system of ethics also. To take away his belief in the possibility of changing other metals into gold would be to convert the alchemist into an atheist.

How, then, was the trans.m.u.tation to be accomplished? Evidently by the method whereby nature brings to perfection other living things; for the alchemist's belief in the simplicity and unity of nature compelled him to regard metals as living things.

Plants are improved by appropriate culture, by digging and enriching the soil, by judicious selection of seed; animals are improved by careful breeding. By similar processes metals will be encouraged and helped towards perfection. The perfect state of gold will not be reached at a bound; it will be gained gradually. Many partial purifications will be needed. As _Subtle_ says in _The Alchemist_--

'twere absurd To think that nature in the earth bred gold Perfect in the instant; something went before, There must be remote matter....

Nature doth first beget the imperfect, then Proceeds she to the perfect.

At this stage the alchemical argument becomes very ultra-physical. It may, perhaps, be rendered somewhat as follows:--

Man is the most perfect of animals; in man there is a union of three parts, these are body, soul, and spirit. Metals also may be said to have a body, a soul, and a spirit; there is a specific bodily, or material, form belonging to each metal; there is a metalline soul characteristic of this or that cla.s.s of metals; there is a spirit, or inner immaterial potency, which is the very essence of all metals.

The soul and spirit of man are clogged by his body. If the spiritual nature is to become the dominating partner, the body must be mortified: the alchemists, of course, used this kind of imagery, and it was very real to them. In like manner the spirit of metals will be laid bare and enabled to exercise its transforming influences, only when the material form of the individual metal has been destroyed. The first thing to do, then, is to strip off and cast aside those properties of metals which appeal to the senses.

"It is necessary to deprive matter of its qualities in order to draw out its soul," said Stepha.n.u.s of Alexandria in the 7th century; and in the 17th century Paracelsus said, "Nothing of true value is located in the body of a substance, but in the virtue ... the less there is of body the more in proportion is the virtue."

But the possession of the soul of metals is not the final stage: mastery of the soul may mean the power of trans.m.u.ting a metal into another like itself; it will not suffice for the great trans.m.u.tation, for in that process a metal becomes gold, the one and only perfect metal. Hence the soul also must be removed, in order that the spirit, the essence, the kernel, may be obtained.

And as it is with metals, so, the alchemists argued, it is with all things. There are a few _Principles_ which may be thought of as conditioning the specific bodily and material forms of things; beneath these, there are certain _Elements_ which are common to many things whose principles are not the same; and, hidden by the wrappings of elements and principles, there is the one _Essence_, the spirit, the mystic uniting bond, the final goal of the philosopher.

I propose in this chapter to try to a.n.a.lyse the alchemical conceptions of Elements and Principles, and in the next chapter to attempt some kind of description of the Essence.