Introduction to the Divine Art of Chemistry

and has claimed this name for itself, namely Alchemy. If, therefore, the science of minerals is true, then the science of Alchemy is also true entirely, and its parts following it. And so it is of all arts and sciences. The cause of those things which have been said is only so that we may give to understand that all subalternated arts and sciences, however much they are descending, and in the end, are true, because they arise from true principles. Therefore, the art of Alchemy for this reason is necessarily true. When, however, from the beginning of the entry into this art, we had begun to taste something, it immediately seemed easy to us, as it happens almost to all who enter into it at first glance, and very few and light doubts, which we almost scorned, occurred to us. But when we tasted much further, we perceived that we had been deceived, and had been like nursing children, ignorant of the chewing of hard and difficult things, and unable. And just as when imprudent youths, wanting to walk through the paths of the old and the wise, believing they know what they do not know, and they consider the old, ancient, and wise to be ignorant. Converted, therefore, we saw that it is necessary that we adhere thoroughly to the counsel of the old, and not depart from it. And then very many, difficult, and obscure doubts began to emerge, which daily molest us to find solutions, both by speculating and by operating. And the more we study and inquire, the more they incur anew. For thus we hope to be able to truly reach the end of this art, the divine goodness and clemency being proposed, and revealing it by its grace, if one is truthful. Furthermore, we say that just as things behave toward being, so they behave toward being understood and known, and consequently toward being signified. Therefore, from this, a triple mode is found in things, namely the mode of being, the mode of understanding, and the mode of signifying. And because truth is nothing other than the adequacy of the intellect to the things themselves, therefore the intellect, by knowing things, conceives things as they are, and is verified about the things themselves. Whence it is said in the third book of Metaphysics that the same are the principles of being of things and of knowing. And because the concepts of things in the intellect are not sufficient...