Chemical Letters to Excellent Philosophers and Physicians in Germany

TO THE READER

It is not indeed fair for anyone who has incurred many expenses for a discipline to be defrauded of his own profit. But since there are many for whom the art has cost nothing, or for whom a buyer is not found because of an excessive price, what profit should they expect? Or is it really too little to enjoy the fame of being well-deserving of the public? If you value your papers so highly that no one can give an equivalent, why do you not give them for free, imitating the example of the painter Zeuxis ancient Greek painter known for his generosity? Those who abound in treasures could free the apparatus from the concealers, and make them of public right by their own benefit, and they would attain an immortal name. But trifles are mostly valued highly by the very poor. They would act more happily if they aspired to progress from a small beginning. Since there is such an abundance of stipendiaries and the income of those begging publicly, enough could be gathered from the remnants of alms as was sufficient for the beginning of the art, especially if it is fruitful in hope. I would like those to whom the letters are written to be asked not to think their names are proposed here in the same way as charlatans original: "agyrtæ" are accustomed to [display] their tablets in the fairs. I have always been studious of the honor of good men. I still want it to be safe and sound. My epistolary method is as far from the consultations of Paracelsians followers of Paracelsus and letters extorted by fraud and published against the will of the authors, as honesty is from fraud and deceit, and liberality from baseness. Therefore, I do not present myself as a doctor and master,