whole towns with gold and silver. Even their books proclaim their vanity, for
they inscribe in them the names of Plato and Aristotle and other philosophers,
in order that such high-sounding inscriptions may impose upon simple people
and pass for learning. There is another class of alchemists who do not
change the substance of base metals, but colour them to represent gold or silver,
so that they appear to be that which they are not, and when this appearance
is taken from them by the fire, as if it were a garment foreign to them, they
return to their own character. These alchemists, since they deceive people,
are not only held in the greatest odium, but their frauds are a capital offence.
No less a fraud, warranting capital punishment, is committed by a third sort
of alchemists ; these throw into a crucible a small piece of gold or silver
bidden in a coal, and after mixing therewith fluxes which have the power of
extracting it, pretend to be making gold from orpiment, or silver from tin and
like substances. But concerning the art of alchemy, if it be an art, I will
speak further elsewhere. I will now return to the art of mining.
Since no authors have written of this art in its entirety, and since
foreign nations and races do not understand our tongue, and, if they did
understand it, would be able to learn only a small part of the art through the
works of those authors whom we do possess, I have written these twelve books
De Re Metallica. Of these, the first book contains the arguments which may
be used against this art, and against metals and the mines, and what can be
said in their favour. The second book describes the miner, and branches into
Hermes Trismegistos was a legendary Egyptian personage supposed to have flourished
before 1,500 b.c., and by some considered to be a corruption of the god Thoth. He is supposed
to have written a number of works, but those extant have been demonstrated to date not
prior to the second Century ; he is referred to by the later Greek Alchemists, and was
believed to have possessed the secret of transmutation. Osthanes was also a very shadowy
personage, and was considered by some Alchemists to have been an Egyptian prior to Hermes,
by others to have been the teacher of Zoroaster. Pliny mentions a magician of this name
who accompanied Xerxes' army. Later there are many others of this name, and the most
probable explanation is that this was a favourite pseudonym for ancient magicians ; there
is a very old work, of no great interest, in MSS in Latin and Greek, in the Munich, Gotha,
Vienna, and other libraries, by one of this name. Agathodaemon was still another shadowy
character referred to by the older Alchemists. There are MSS in the Florence, Paris, Escurial,
and Munich libraries bearing his name, but nothing tangible is known as to whether he was
an actual man or if these writings are not of a much later period than claimed.
To the next group belong the Greek Alchemists, who flourished during the rise and
decline of Alexandria, from 200 b.c. to 700 a.D., and we give them in order of their dates.
Comerius was considered by his later fellow professionals to have been the teacher of the art
to Cleopatra (ist Century B.c.), and a MSS with a title to that effect exists in the Bibliothèque
Nationale at Paris. The celebrated Cleopatra seems to have stood very high in the estimation
of the Alchemists ; perhaps her doubtful character found a response among them ; there are
various works extant in MSS attributed to her, but nothing can be known as to their
authenticity. Lucius Apulejus or Apuleius was born in Numidia about the 2nd Century ;
he was a Roman Platonic Philosopher, and was the author of a romance, " The Metamorphosis,
or the Golden Ass." Synesius was a Greek, but of unknown period ; there is a MSS treatise
on the Philosopher's Stone in the library at Leyden under his name, and various printed works
are attributed to him ; he mentions " water of saltpetre," and has, therefore, been hazarded
to be the earliest recorder of nitric acid. The work here referred to as " Heliodorus to
Theodosius " was probably the MSS in the Libraries at Paris, Vienna, Munich, etc., under
the title of " Heliodorus the Philosopher's Poem to the Emperor Theodosius the Great on the
Mystic Art of the Philosophers, etc." His period would, therefore, be about the 4th Century.
Toe Alexandrian Zosimus is more generally known as Zosimus the Panopolite, from Panopolis,
an ancient town on the Nile ; he flourished in the 5th Century, and belonged to the
Alexandrian School of Alchemists ; he should not be confused with the Roman historian
of the same name and period. The following statement is by Boerhaave (Elementa Chemiae,
Pari*, 1724, Chap. I.) :—" The name Chemistry written in Greek, or Chetnia, is so ancient
