Natural Philosophy of Three Ancient Philosophers: Artephius, Flamel, and Synesius

...volatile and spiritual things, and the tinging water original: aquam tingentem, a liquid capable of "tinging" or imbuing a substance with a new, permanent color or quality., which has the power of entry. For it causes bodies to become pure spirit; this is because it softens The original Latin incerat refers to "inceration," the process of adding liquid to a dry substance until it reaches a soft, wax-like consistency. hard and dry bodies and prepares them for fusion—that is, it converts them into permanent water. It thus creates from the bodies a most precious and blessed oil, which is the true tincture and white permanent water, being of a warm and moist nature, tempered, subtle, and as fusible as wax; it penetrates, goes deep, tints, and perfects. Therefore, our water immediately dissolves gold and silver and creates an incombustible oil, which can then be mixed with other imperfect bodies Base metals like lead or copper that have not yet been "perfected" into gold..

For our water converts bodies into the nature of a fusible salt, which is called the Salt Albroth Salt Albroth: Also known as Sal Albroth; a highly purified alchemical salt used as a universal key or solvent. of the philosophers, the best and noblest of all salts, fixed in the heat-regime The "regime" refers to the specific stages of fire or temperature control in the alchemical work. and not fleeing from the fire. And it is indeed an oil of a warm, subtle, penetrating, deepening, and entering nature, called the complete Elixir complete Elixir: Elixir completum, the final perfected medicine of the Third Order, capable of instantaneous transmutation., and it is the hidden secret of the wise Alchemists. He who knows this salt of the Sun and Moon Gold and silver., and its generation or preparation, and knows how to afterwards mix and unite it with other imperfect bodies, truly knows one of the greatest secrets of nature and the one way of perfection.

These bodies thus dissolved by our water are called quicksilver quicksilver: argentum vivum, referring here to the "living" philosophical mercury extracted from metals, rather than common quicksilver., which is not without sulfur, nor is sulfur without the nature of the luminaries The "luminaries" are the Sun (gold) and the Moon (silver)., because the luminaries are the principal means in form through which nature passes in perfecting and completing its generation. And this quicksilver is called the honored, animated, and pregnant salt, and fire—since it is nothing but fire; nor is it fire, except for sulfur; nor sulfur, except for the quicksilver extracted from the Sun and Moon by our water and reduced into a stone of high price; that is, it will be the material of the luminaries altered and changed from vileness into nobility.

Note that this white sulfur is the father of metals and their mother, our Mercury, and the ore of gold, and the soul, and the ferment, and the mineral virtue, and the living body, and the perfect medicine, and our sulfur, and our quicksilver—that is, sulfur of sulfur, quicksilver of quicksilver, and Mercury of Mercury. Therefore, the property of our water is that it liquefies gold and silver and increases their native color. For it converts bodies from corporeality into spirituality, and it is that which sends into the body the white smoke, which is the white soul—subtle, warm, and of great fire-nature. This water is also called the bloodstone bloodstone: lapis sanguinaris, used here to represent a vital, life-giving spiritual essence or "blood" of the stone.; it is also the spiritual virtue of blood without which nothing is made, and the subject of all things capable of being liquefied; and of liquefaction, which is very well suited to the Sun and Moon.