BOOK THREE

THE ESSENCE AND PRAISES OF TRUE ALCHEMY

ARE ASSERTED AGAINST THE CALUMNIES OF MOMUS.

Large decorative woodcut initial 'S' featuring scrolling floral and vine motifs.

I cannot be seized by enough amazement that such great madness has crept into men, that they yearn to involve themselves with such unheard-of vehemence in those arts in which they have never sown even the smallest seed, or whose genuine fundamentals they have hardly learned. Instead:

original: "Quid non mortalia pectora cogit / Auri sacra fames." A famous line from Virgil’s Aeneid (3.56). While "sacra" usually means "holy," in this context it means "accursed" or "detestable."

The greater part of men (I say) is incited and agitated more by the stings of greed than by any devotion toward such a profound mystery of divinity. They do not consider that the Philosophers themselves, who were most excellently well-versed in this essential art, were so secret and cautious in their writings—the more to hide the matter from fools and the profane rabble—that they were accustomed to write one thing while sincerely meaning another. By this means, they signaled the art to those who knew it (whom they called "the sons of the art") in such a way that the unworthy and the "Thrasos" Thraso is a stock character from Roman comedy representing a "braggart soldier." Fludd uses it to describe arrogant, boastful men. of the world might not taste, along with the worthy, from their Heliconian fount Mount Helicon was the home of the Muses; its springs provided poetic and divine inspiration. flowing with living waters, nor become intoxicated by the divine nectar. And hence it was that they were "false" in their books, so that where they spoke most openly, they most effectively concealed their art.

Why then, in all their works, have they exposed to an unworthy and indeed ungrateful world nothing but a few roses, both white and red In alchemy, the White Rose symbolizes the "Albedo" (whiteness/purification) and the Red Rose symbolizes the "Rubedo" (redness/perfection) of the Philosopher's Stone., but interspersed and overshadowed by infinite thorns and thistles? They have filled their practical science with so many (I say) vain recipes that they seem to have inserted nothing but mere lies in place of the truth.

Nevertheless, the truth is to be found beneath that fictional bark, or series of words, and perceived by the wise with open eyes. From this, therefore, has arisen that "bastard Chemistry" with its spurious sons, who, gasping for gold and riches, lose themselves in the labyrinth of this divine science. In such works, they not only waste their own labors in vain, but also squander the fortunes and possessions of others. For they are accustomed to catch and tempt others with that same "golden hook" A metaphor for using the promise of gold to lure investors or victims. of greed, so that they might revive their own lost fortunes or aid their current feeble state; they strive with the greatest effort to induce them by various oaths, vows, and certain promises. And just as they have fallen from greed into poverty, so indeed does this poverty of theirs—instead of transmuting base metal into perfect gold—transform the craftsmen themselves from good men into scoundrels and deceitful deceivers, rather than pious teachers.

Others, having lost faith in Alchemy, turn their experiments with Antimony, mercury, vitriols, sulfur, iron, and other such things to the use of medicine (their fortunes having been lost), and are forced to acquire a living by begging. Others, miserably languishing and consuming their entire age and life in that sort of trivial and adulterated Alchemy, are finally abandoned by all their friends, and are seen to wear out the remainder of their lives in hospitals In this period, "hospitals" often referred to almshouses or poorhouses for the destitute..

Hence, therefore, so many outcries have arisen against this holy art, and so many defamations, staining its chaste virginity, labeling it as...