DEDICATION.

requires it, but the acumen of philosophers and a true, and not inconsiderable, skill in natural things, such as cannot fall to the lot of deserters of the cobbler's bench. Your Amplitude, most consulted Men, just as it feels clearly regarding true chemistry and does not turn away from its professors—but embraces them with favor—in imitation of great Kings and most praiseworthy Republics: so do I hold it as a settled conviction of my mind that you are most alien to impostors, and that you carry about this considered judgment, that an art is not to be despoiled of its honor, although it may be treated most poorly by Paracelsian dregs. Indeed, I have labored upon it as much as other studies permitted. But the more I turn it over, the more it pleases me, to such an extent that I have been led to accommodate its precepts to the form of perfect sciences and to illustrate it with the Aristotelian constitution of the arts and the Ramaean referring to the method of Petrus Ramus method. For I have seen how obscurely, perplexedly, and corruptly Paracelsus described it. By true philosophers, it has been explained piecemeal and handed down dispersedly. For in one place, it is taught regarding chrysurgia gold-working alone. In another, regarding...