Chemical Letters to Excellent Philosophers and Physicians in Germany

DEDICATION.

have obtained the highest praise for erudition, and did not lose it even in death. How many families of Kings, Princes, and heroes; how many republics have embraced it? There is hardly a person among the entire nobility who does not cherish something of chemical science, and enjoy certain formulas of precious operations as if they were a hereditary treasure. Thus, the honor and breadth of this art extend far and wide. Indeed, there are found in the order of natural scientists and physicians some of lesser skill who, because they cannot achieve what they desire due to their own weakness or fortune, do not blush to condemn it with the ignorant judgment of the masses. But they are struck by the most weighty judgment of Iacobus Sylvius Ambianus, the great philosopher, physician, and chemist, by which they are held among the idiots and compilers of prescriptions, as those to whom it has been denied to know anything excellent. There also occur everywhere, sprung from the embers of the insane Paracelsus, those petty schemers and dung beetles who thrust themselves into the courts of Princes and magnates with insane promises of gold; and while they are detected as being the most vain and mendacious, they seem to brand some stain upon a most true and chaste art. Whence, in the