LUDUS PUERORUM
OR
Treatise on Women's Labor and Children's Play
Translation from Latin by an anonymous author
Introduction
The Procession of the Work is said to be all woman's work and child's play. After entering the work, the subtle inquisitor of nature continues his progress. The words are not fabulous or contemptible, on the contrary, you must read them carefully so that the texts of the ancients, which sometimes transpose the words, do not deceive you, as A. Pipus says in his Book of Secrets.
Now, the triple game of children must precede the work of women. Because children play in three things. First, often with very old walls, second with urine, third with coals. The first game provides the material for the Stone. The second game increases the soul. The third game prepares the body for life. Indeed, from the flower of the blood, saltpeter is made by the first game of children, which once realized, it only remains to animate it and dissolve it frequently in water with its companion by two other childish games, necessary until the third heat of our Elixir in the work of women which is only to cook. Let him therefore who can understand understand. Moreover, in our Stone, which all the Philosophers sought, is found the first elements of the minerals and the tincture, the lime and the soul, the spirit and the volatile fixed body, the Mercury, not just any, but that around which nature began its first operations by which it determined it to be metallic in nature, but it left the thing imperfect. If therefore you will have extracted this thing from where it is, with it you will have begun the work, beginning with what nature left imperfect, you will find there a perfect thing, and you will rejoice, as King Geber said. This thing from which the stone is extracted, the poor as much as the rich possess it. She is the work of women and children's play, and the stone is her flower. but that around which nature began its first operations by which it determined it to metallic nature, but it left the thing imperfect. If therefore you will have extracted this thing from where it is, with it you will have begun the work, beginning with what nature left imperfect, you will find there a perfect thing, and you will rejoice, as King Geber said. This thing from which the stone is extracted, the poor as much as the rich possess it. She is the work of women and children's play, and the stone is her flower. but that around which nature began its first operations by which it determined it to metallic nature, but it left the thing imperfect. If therefore you will have extracted this thing from where it is, with it you will have begun the work, beginning with what nature left imperfect, you will find there a perfect thing, and you will rejoice, as King Geber said. This thing from which the stone is extracted, the poor as much as the rich possess it. She is the work of women and children's play, and the stone is her flower. there you will find a perfect thing, and you will rejoice, as King Geber said. This thing from which the stone is extracted, the poor as much as the rich possess it. She is the work of women and children's play, and the stone is her flower. there you will find a perfect thing, and you will rejoice, as King Geber said. This thing from which the stone is extracted, the poor as much as the rich possess it. She is the work of women and children's play, and the stone is her flower.
So take in the name of God, this thing which is not perfect. Of a perfect thing, indeed, nothing can be done, because the species of perfect things do not change their nature, but they can be corrupted. This thing from which we extract our Stone, or the matter of the Stone, is not deeply imperfect, because, by Art, of such an imperfection nothing could be done since Art cannot annihilate the first dispositions of nature. This thing is a middle thing between perfect and imperfect bodies. What nature has not perfected in her, but only begun, by Art can be brought to perfection. Also the Philosopher Fludius says: man is the most worthy of creatures for whom by favor and love all things have been built and subjugated. Also this thing from which the body receives no esteem, nevertheless has in it that which preserves health and youth, which drives out languor and diseases of man and metals and consumes all superfluity. This is all our Elixir does, and better than any medicines, potions, and concoctions of Galen, Hypocrates, Avicenna, and other Philosophers; also he expels leprosy from man. Of this thing, Albert the Great says, in his Minerals, that a very great virtue is found in every man and especially in the head, between his teeth, so that nowadays, one has often found in ancient burials, gold in small and oblong grains between the teeth of the dead. This would be impossible if in man were not some mineral virtue, which is in our Elixir. This is why the Stone is said to be in every man. Adam brought it with him from Paradise and from this matter in each man we must extract our Stone or Elixir.
For this Arnoldus says:
"that it was never the intention of the Philosophers that our Stone was by the mineral principles namely quicksilver and sulfur (vulgar). But in the perfect bodies where there is a perfect commixture between this living moon and this excellent living sulfur."
When the body is mixed with the spirits, it becomes a single thing with them, so that one never separates from the other, just like water mixed with water, because the whole has been returned to the nature of its homogeneity. And if it were not, the Philosophers would not have said that if the bodies are not converted into incorporeal, nothing will be done in this Art. Note well these words, seal the mysteries: because in this Work is declared what is our Stone since the Principle of the Philosophers is to dissolve the Stone thus. If our Stone was composed by the first mineral principles, it would be necessary to sublimate it, calcine it, fix it and finally dissolve it, which is contrary to every Philosopher because they say that if the bodies do not become incorporeal, you will obtain nothing. In conclusion, we must therefore say that the principle of our Work is the solution of our stone because the dissolved bodies are reduced to the nature of spirits and are better fixed. So the solution of the body is the coagulation of the spirit.
From there, the Philosopher Anaxagoras says that:
"our Stone is a sublime sun and returned to the greatest mineral virtue".
From where Liliator says:
"from this gold and precious gem, we obtained a lot of pure gold".
Alphidius the Philosopher says:
"Freeze quicksilver by the body of our magnesia".
The Philosophers do not mean the quicksilver that we see, but by quicksilver they mean the humidity of this mixture which is the radical humidity of our Stone. And by magnesia, they did not mean that seen by the vulgar, but all the mixture from which we extract this humidity which we call our quicksilver. This moisture, in truth, runs in the fire and, in the same fire,
Alphidius the Philosopher says:
"In our Stone or compound, are the Sun and the Moon in virtue and power, and quicksilver in nature; for if these things were not in our Stone and compound, there would be neither Sun nor Moon".
And yet, it is not common gold nor common silver, because this Sun and this Moon which are in our Work, that is to say in Stone or compound, are better than those of the vulgar. Indeed, the Sun and Moon which are in our compound are bright and green, while those of the vulgar are dead. The Sun and the Moon of our Stone or compound are there in potency and not visibly.
Our Stone, what it is to the touch, weight, taste and smell.
Mithridates says to Plodius:
"The touch of our stone is delicate and there is more delicacy in it than in its body. Its taste is very sweet although its nature is acid".
In fact, its smell, before making it, is heavy and fetid, and it takes on the smell of a dead body. Also its smell is bad and likened to that of sepulchres. His weight is serious. I have never known another stone like it in effect. In this Stone are contained the four elements. It is similar to the world and to the composition of the world. In this world, there is no other stone for our Art and whoever will have sought another stone for our Work, will be entirely frustrated in his intentions.
How our Stone must title recognized by the circumstances.
And if you don't understand our Stone by this means, you will never hear it. Hali, Philosopher and King says in the Peat:
"Our Stone is at all times and in all places, with every man, etc..."
Arnauld de Villeneuve says:
"Keep it certain that the expenses of our very noble Art do not exceed the price of two gold coins at its first acquisition, that is to say operation. However, this medicine must become accustomed to fire, just as the child is fed on his mother's breast".
Arnaud also says:
"There are three mines from which we must extract our Stone. From any vegetable, we can extract and bring out a quicksilver which has in itself the four elements of which we can make our physical Stone; in truth, we cannot extract it from anything else. Know, truly, that God the Most High Creator, naturally made three principal and very excellent Mercurys. say in the vine. The third is in the animals, namely in the liver".
From these three Mercurys, therefore, we extract the living Mercury that the Philosophers sought, which possesses in itself the four elements and the four colors. To make the Stone of the Philosophers one takes especially this quicksilver. Indeed, this mineral, vegetable or animal quicksilver is golden and clear and it is the best. Such bright silver is taken for our Stone, because its color is like the wind in its belly, as Hermes says.
Of the vase or egg of the Philosophers in which our Stone must be placed so that by fire and Art it may be perfected.
Morien said:
"If the ancient Sages had not found the quantity of the vase in which our Stone must be put, they would never have reached the perfection of this Magisterium. Then King Hali said: "Know the measure or the degree of the vase of our Work, because the vase is the root and the Principle of our Magisterium. And this vessel is like the womb in animals, because in it they engender and conceive and also generation is nourished there. For this, if the vessel of our magisterium is not suitable, the whole work is destroyed and our Stone does not produce the effect of generation because it does not find the vessel proper to generation". Then Jean Auster, Philosopher, says:
"You just have to put the Stone once in our vase and as long as it is closed, the magisterium will be accomplished. But what is too big comes evil, no doubt because quicksilver does not change into red or white. Everything else that is said about it is to hide the Art".
An example. For the generation of man, the vegetative lime is never introduced with seed matter except once. If, on the contrary, it were introduced a second time, then one would destroy the other by the crudity of the blood or by the actual entry, or by the superabundance of matter. Thus, women who submit to a large number of different men rarely conceive. And if they conceive, they give birth to an abortion, because if one submits raw things to others, undigested to digested, they do not nourish the fetus but kill it. The reason is that the fetus feeds only on menstrual semen and grows until it comes to light.
Also King Hali, speaking of our vase, says:
"Given our vase is made the passion, that we put therefore up to the measure of a pound and no more, because in our Stone there are winds, contained between our vase and the matter of the Stone which, if they have not been well locked up, emerge from it so that the magisterium is annihilated".
Morien says:
"Take the egg, that is to say the vase and the igneous things. Strike with a sword and collect its soul: indeed, that is closure".
The Philosopher says:
"Keep the vessel and its bond so that it may be powerful in conservation. For the water which before was in the earth and could not escape, now has returned to its earth in the highest parts of the vessel, so the earth begets, by means of fire, the water which before was in its body, that is to say in the earth".
Albert the Great also said, on the generation of our Stone:
"The place is the Principle of generation and the place engenders it by the properties of the sky which influence it by the roots of the stars. And what the elemental and celestial virtues do in the natural vases, they also do it in the artificial vases, on the condition however that the artificial ones are well formed, in the manner of the natural ones".
Here Plato says:
"As by the movement of the firmament, the revolution of the elements takes place, (By this revolution the subtle bodies strive to rise upwards, while what is heavy remains below.) so it is in the work of the expert alchemists. It is therefore necessary to fortify the vase by which all the firmament is resolved in its narrow circuit. Indeed, what we seek in our Work, comes from the elements".
Hermes says:
"The vase of the Philosophers is their water. Note the subvegetal Mercury, which contains and preserves matter and spirits by its viscosity".
To know the things that enter into the work and into our Magisterium.
Morien says:
"Know that those who, in the work, martyr the bodies of minerals and spirits, that is to say sulphur, arsenic, orpiment and others of the vulgar, those do not find anything deep in them. But our Work is Philosophers and it is honourable".
From which the Philosopher James says:
"It is evident that our Work is composed of body, spirit and soul, and not of mineral spirits like quicksilver, sulphur, arsenic or salt armonia because these things are vain and useless and are not spirits, if not by equivocation, for these things are bodies although they become smoke. Besides, they do not possess constancy, therefore they cannot be the root in our blessed Work , neither on their own, nor with an adjuvant:
Of the division of Stone in the quartet of elements. And of the property of any element which is in the Stone divided into four elements.
The Philosopher Jean Auster says:
"Every body is an element or a compound of elements and every composition and generation consists of the four simple elements. This is why it is necessary that our Stone should have been reduced to its first sulphurous and mercurial matter and origin. After that it must be divided into elements, otherwise it could not be purified or broken, and its parts would have no ingrest power if its body were not divided into small parts".
That one thus purifies its parts well, and that those are well joined with the communes, thus operates the Elixir which one seeks. For experience destroys its specific form and introduces a new species. For this, after the division of the elements, nothing of them is seen, nor touched, except water and earth: because air and fire are never seen in our Stone, nor are their virtues felt except in the purer elements, and because they have become more rarefied and simple they cannot be seen with bodily eyes. Therefore, this extracted stone is enough for you provided that you reduce it to the simple effect of its virtue.
Likewise, in it are the four elements ie fire, air, water, earth. There are found the four principles or qualities: hot, moist, cold, and dry, of which two are friends and two enemies, two are passive and two are active, two ascend and two descend. One is in the middle and the other below that one. The reason is that the opposite does not unite with its opposite, except through an intermediary. Therefore, what is not contrary is united by itself. The hot and the dry unite of themselves because they are in no way contrary and these two elements, fire and air, unite well by themselves; but the heat and the cold do not unite except through an intermediary, that is to say through the humid and the cold, because they cannot stay together by themselves, one being always constrained by the other. The damp and the cold remain well together; hot and cold aggregate and disaggregate homogeneous things, but not heterogeneous ones, by dissolving and congealing. The wet and the dry aggregate and disintegrate by squeezing and wetting. The operation of the elements, therefore, is a simple generation and a natural mutation. Therefore, it is evident that all things are varied by the operation of hot and cold. They are very simply generated and transformed naturally. Hot and cold enliven matter. When the agents are defeated, it becomes obvious what the variable parts are made of, because we do not make anything out of anything,
In the same way Arnauld says, on the operations and the effects of the elements The earth dries up and fixes, the water cleans and washes, the air and the fire moreover make flow and dye. There must therefore be a lot of water, a lot of air, because there will be as much abundance of tincture as there will have been an abundance of air. Water indeed is a purifier, and it is the cause which makes the clarity of the whole body and of medicine; where it comes from that frequent distillations are the cleansing of the elements.
As water unites with earth, earth unites with fire; for charred earth is aflame and fire predominates in it, just as water is congealed and thickened with earth and air, and this though it is one substance which has different effects in accordance with the elements. So our water too, in our Stone, is called by different names.
Two waters act on the earth to wash and dye it. Since it washes, it is called water, since it dyes it is called air. First the water is separated, then the air; the fire, on the other hand, which is joined to the air, increases the heat and strengthens it, and it removes the superfluous moisture from the same water. It compresses and compacts what is rarefied and soft.
Likewise fire and air agree in quality, therefore they are difficult to separate from each other. Also they are purified together like water. While the water is first cleansed by a light fire, the air and the fire separate with great difficulty from the earth which, after it has been calcined, remains dry Almost like fire. Similarly, the air is better than the water, for although the water bathes the earth and whitens it by marrying the tinctures, yet the air tints the earth and infuses it with soul and fusibility. Mark well what I have said, and you will have the Stone in your Work of water and earth only, and you will use the dry Stone of fire and air only. the air really is oil, tincture, Sun, soul and ointment of the Philosophers which perfects the whole magisterium. The air is tinted water and its tincture is fire because the same water is body and the air is the spirit that carries fire. But the oil is likeness of soul which exists in the body, and this oil is never extracted from the body except by means of water, by long decoction. Indeed, water is an extracted spirit. The oil is like the soul in the body and nothing else. water is an extracted spirit. The oil is like the soul in the body and nothing else. water is an extracted spirit. The oil is like the soul in the body and nothing else.
Similarly, Arnauld says again of the effects of the four elements.
Air nourishes fire as water nourishes earth. Indeed, fire lives on air and air lives on the element of water, and water on the element of earth. So fix the earth and the water so that the air can fix itself in water, because if you have killed the water well, you have killed all the elements, and they are dead. Nevertheless, water does not appear without the earth, and a fruit never arises without a body in which, while it dies, the seed can give the fruit, because the earth remains fixed in itself, also it fixes with itself and retains the other elements. the water in truth, since it is cold and humid, purifies the earth and thickens it, because the cold and humid is the thickener of dryness. However, the wet is quick to receive an impression and quickly gets rid of it, also the dry and the humid unite and temper each other reciprocally. The dry acquires moisture by continuance of the parts, just as the moist easily receives and acquires an impression of the dry which holds the imprint firmly and endures any fire. Thus the wet defends the dry from its separation and the dry defends the wet from its malleability, while the air surrounds the water, clarifies and reddens the earth and tints it so that it is suitable for extension and fusion. Fire ripens any compound, it subtilizes and reddens, greases and strengthens the air, tightens the coldness of earth and water, and brings back to a better complexion, it gives quantity just as the moist easily receives and acquires an impression of the dry, which holds the impression firmly and endures all fire. Thus the wet defends the dry from its separation and the dry defends the wet from its malleability, while the air surrounds the water, clarifies and reddens the earth and tints it so that it is suitable for extension and fusion. Fire ripens any compound, it subtilizes and reddens, greases and strengthens the air, tightens the coldness of earth and water, and brings back to a better complexion, it gives quantity just as the moist easily receives and acquires an impression of the dry, which holds the impression firmly and endures all fire. Thus the wet defends the dry from its separation and the dry defends the wet from its malleability, while the air surrounds the water, clarifies and reddens the earth and tints it so that it is suitable for extension and fusion. Fire ripens any compound, it subtilizes and reddens, greases and strengthens the air, tightens the coldness of earth and water, and brings back to a better complexion, it gives quantity clarifies and rubifies the earth and the complexion so that it is suitable for extension and fusion. Fire ripens any compound, it subtilizes and reddens, greases and strengthens the air, tightens the coldness of earth and water, and brings back to a better complexion, it gives quantity clarifies and rubifies the earth and the complexion so that it is suitable for extension and fusion. Fire ripens any compound, it subtilizes and reddens, greases and strengthens the air, tightens the coldness of earth and water, and brings back to a better complexion, it gives quantity
The heavy elements, which are earth and water, are for fixity and stillness. Light elements are more useful for fusing and dyeing. From which Aristotle says:
"I will divide the Stone for you into four operations, that is to say four elements. When, therefore, you have had water from air, air from fire and fire from earth, then you will have the complete Art and the tincture. Arrange therefore the earthy substance by distillation into moisture and heat until they meet and are no longer in disagreement or separate. I will then add two operative virtues, namely water and fire, for if you you have mixed water only, it will whiten, and if you have added fire it will redden by the bounty of nature and the Creator etc..".
Of the separation of the elements in our Stone that we must understand philosophically.
The Philosopher Rasis says:
"Know in truth that none of the philosophers has heard that our Stone is divided separately into the four elements, as fools do..."
and as it follows from what Arnauld says:
"Know in truth that in our Stone the elements are not divided according to substance but according to virtue, because an element is never found pure and simple, unless it is in its sphere".
It happens, however, that the active and passive qualities of the elements, according to some predominance, can reciprocally separate and divide, as for example during the separation of sticky water and its substance where coldness predominates; then we say that the water is separated. But if one separates the deeper substance where heat predominates, then one says that air and fire are separated and one speaks of aerial or igneous substance. Let him who can understand understand, and who cannot, that he does not interfere in Science and in Art. In conclusion, it must be said:
"Our water is extracted from the substance of the hand (sic) and not from another, because in these there is more tincture. As for the earth, I do not think of any color or substance until it is subtle, clear, fixed, etc...".
Of the true philosophical putrefaction of our Pierre.
Arnaud in his Rosary says:
"In our Work, putrefaction is necessary, because there is nothing that does not have birth or growth or soul except after putrefaction. If the body has not been putrefied, it cannot be melted or dissolved, and if it has not been dissolved, it will be annihilated".
Our putrefaction, therefore, is neither sordid nor filthy, but it is at least a commixtion of water with earth and earth with water until the body becomes a single thing. Here the Philosopher Morien says:
"In the putrefaction of our bronze, the spirits are put in the body and dry up there. And if the water is not dried up with the earth, the colors will not appear".
So our putrefaction is nothing but the death of the wet with the dry. And our putrefaction does not happen without the wet and the dry, because the earth is kept dry and cannot rise by itself. The reason is that heavy things cannot rise up, nor light things stay down with heavy things and be moved down without their help; but both are the beginning and the end of each other.
From there King Hali says:
"Know that if you have not sublimated the body until it becomes water, the water will not become completely putrid, nor will it be able to freeze except by fire".
Indeed the fire freezes the commixtion of our Stone. And similarly, we dissolve the bodies so that the heat adheres to their depth. And thus only fire transforms water and earth of their natures and colors.
How our water is blackened by its nature, hear Jean Auster.
Jean Auster says:
"First, in truth, the more our brass is cooked and the more it blackens and dissolves, and the more it becomes subtle and spiritual water. Secondly, the more it is cooked and the more it thickens and dries up becoming of a great whiteness. Third, the more it is cooked and the more it becomes colored and reddened, becoming a tincture of more intense redness".
It is necessary that our Stone first become black, which is proven thus: the generation of one only happens by the corruption of the other. But corruption by putrefaction only happens by heat acting in the moist. Now, heat acting in the moist first creates darkness: thus it becomes evident that the beginning of our Work is darkness and the crow's head.
"When you have seen the blackness come to this water, then know that the body is liquefied. It is then expedient to continue a light fire on the same until it has known a tenebrous mist which it will have generated. The intention of all the Philosophers has always been that the body now dissolved in black powder, enter into its water so that the whole becomes one thing, and pure water welcomes water as its own nature. " The Rosary of the Philosophers says : "This blackness of water must be cooked by a light fire until it is blackened in its water, that is to say until the whole becomes water. Then
indeed
,water mixes with water and water takes in water so that they cannot separate from each other".
The false alchemists and the ignorant, on hearing water, believe that it is the water of the vulgar. But if they had read the books of the Philosophers, they would certainly know that this water is pregnant with childbirth. This one however, without its body with which it was conjoined remains only one permanent water.
From there Avicenna says:
"Until darkness is apparent, the dark woman dominates, and she is the first force of our Stone; because if she does not become black before, she will not become white or red, because red has been composed by white and black".
There follows the work of laundering and how our Stone should be laundered.
Listen to the Rosary:
"Our medicine is unique in essence and in action and it is necessary that this medicine, namely the white one, cannot become red nor redden, if previously it was not white; and this because no one can pass from the first to the third degree except through the second".
Thus there is no transition from black to citrine except by white because citrine was composed of very pure black and a lot of white. Therefore, we cannot make this white and red medicine if before it was not black and then afterwards whitened. The white and the red medicine do not differ from each other in essence, but they differ in that the red has a greater sutiliation and a longer cooking time in the regime of its fire. And this is because the end of the white work is the beginning of the red work, and what was perfect in one must be started in the other. Indeed, all our magisterium begins and is perfected in a single way, that is to say by cooking.
The Rosary says:
"The sublime quicksilver of our brass, from which all things are made, is pure water and a true tincture. Of our brass is made the white sulfur which whitens our brass and from which the spirit is restrained so that it does not flee. But this sulfur cannot redden our brass if it has not previously worked to white, for only white sulfur whitens our brass. Therefore it is clear that our brass will be so much the more beautiful as the sulfur has been white. ".
Hence in Peat yew it is said:
"The spirits are united in the color white because they cannot flee".
This is why it is recommended:
"Whiten the brass and tear up your books, lest your hearts be corrupted".
Indeed, the earth putrefies and cleans itself with water. And when it's been cleansed, the blackness will go away and it'll be white. And now the tenebrous one will perish, and the man climbs on the woman and he removes his own darkness. Thus the Mercury, ie the fugitive serf, will penetrate the body and the spirits will be constrained in the dryness and then will cease the corrupting and deformed black and it will be made white and luminous.
Hence the Philosophers say in the Peat:
"Our magnesia does not permit spirits to flee, nor the shade of bronze to appear later. For that itself is the white and fixed sulfur which tints and perfects every body and converts it into white".
The Philosopher says:
"If it were pure quicksilver, the force of the unburning white sulfur would coagulate it into white: and this is an excellent thing that those who work in alchemy can have, and they convert it into white because nature contains within itself a nature and, verily, marriage unites them reciprocally. encloses a nature by teaching it to fight against fire. However, they are not different natures, nor several, but there is only one nature which has in itself all the natures and all that is sufficient for our Art, because with a single disposition nature begins and perfects its Work.
How our Stone must be reddened, listen to the Rosary.
If you have not previously whitened our bronze, you will not be able to redden it because no one can pass from one extremity to the other except through a middle. That is to say, no one can go from black to citrin except by white, because citrin was composed of a lot of white and very pure black. So whiten the black and redden the white and you will have the magisterium.
For as the year is divided into four parts, so is our blessed Work divided. Indeed, there is first winter, cold, humid and rainy. The second period is spring which is hot, humid and flourishing. Third is summer, which is a hot and dry period, ie ruddy. The fourth period is autumn, cold and dry, and it is the time to gather the fruit. By this disposition we tint natural things, until they bear fruit to the desired point; for now the winter has passed, and the rain has passed, the night has retired and in our land the flowers have appeared, the time for the cutting has come. But as well as we are on the white rose, we will only achieve this effect by converting metallic and diseased bodies into white, by Art and operation. And when you have seen this whiteness rising, be certain and happy because in this whiteness the redness has been hidden. And one must not extract this redness, but only conduct the fire until everything is made red: thus it appears that the color of the rubification is perfectly created by the complement of digestion, because in man the blood is not generated if previously it has not been carefully cooked in the liver, and after this redness there is no water or anything else placed there until it is cooked to the complement of the redness. And when you have seen this whiteness rising, be certain and happy because in this whiteness the redness has been hidden. And one must not extract this redness, but only conduct the fire until everything is made red: thus it appears that the color of the rubification is perfectly created by the complement of digestion, because in man the blood is not generated if previously it has not been carefully cooked in the liver, and after this redness there is no water or anything else placed there until it is cooked to the complement of the redness. And when you have seen this whiteness rising, be certain and happy because in this whiteness the redness has been hidden. And one must not extract this redness, but only conduct the fire until everything is made red: thus it appears that the color of the rubification is perfectly created by the complement of digestion, because in man the blood is not generated if previously it has not been carefully cooked in the liver, and after this redness there is no water or anything else placed there until it is cooked to the complement of the redness.
It is indeed the time of summer and of fruits, that is why it is necessary to burn by dry fire without humidity until it is reddened with a perfect redness: therefore do not cease, although the red air somewhat delays in appearing. For as the first digestion of the stomach whitens everything, so the second digestion which is done in the liver reddens everything. Therefore, from what precedes, it is clear that, the fire being increased after the whiteness, you will have the redness of the first colors; while between these colors will appear the citrine. But the citrine color is not stable because immediately after the citrine, the red arises, which appearing our Work is perfect; for there will be the virtue of the male which converts every incomplete body into solar nature.
"If it was pure and clear sulfur with red, and in it was found a simple and non-burning ignite, it will be an excellent thing that the alchemists can collect, that from it they can make gold etc...".
Again on the reciprocal, natural, mutual and circular neighborhood of the elements.
Albert the Great said:
"It should not be overlooked that in everything, circularly reciprocal, by generation, the breakthrough will be all the easier if they have conformity in several points".
Hence it happens that gold is more easily made from silver than from any other metal.
Arrange nature well so that the elements communicate their qualities circularly, until circular transmutations are made of them and the elements are made of a circular transmutation. Thus, for example, the earth communicates its dryness to the fire, then the fire its heat to the air, the air its humidity to the water, then the water communicates its coldness to the earth and the earth again its dryness to the fire.
Circularly, therefore, the earth desires to be in the form of fire because the almost greedy fire acts naturally on the earth and converts the matter of the earth into its own form. Again, the same matter of earth desires to be in the form of air, which air is almost naturally avid for fire; consequently it acts on fire and earthy matter. Fire, had made the earth in its own form, now this matter naturally desires to era in the form of water. The water, eager for this thing, acts on the air and on this matter which was fire, air and earth, and thus converts it into its form. When, therefore, this matter has been molded into all the forms of the elements, it will naturally desire to be all these forms simultaneously; and the elements, greedy for this thing, want naturally and almost violently, to be simultaneously in all these forms, because they are active and passive and contrasting. From this contrast and this brawl, the elemental forms are destroyed and restored under the aspect of the elements; but relatively to itself, that is to say by circular transmutation, the matter of the elements becomes elemental.
Blessed Thomas Aquinas, said of the form of the elements united in the same body:
"I saw and made by artifice cooperating nature. I took a certain sulfur which was of an igneous nature and transmuted it into pure water which, by Art, I transmuted again into air and water. the forms of the elements and their contrasts in this matter of the Stone. I do not know from what virtue it came if not from the passion. By the redness, I became aware of the igneous form, by the diaphaneity, of the form of water and by the luminosity, of the aerial form."
Hence Arnauld in his 10 says:
There are therefore two active elements in comparison with elemental things: water and fire, and two passive ones: air and earth. As much as they are active and passive with each other, as much as they communicate in kind."
This is the reason why an element communicates its quality to another, so that by circulating the quality of this one, it can convert into this one and it is transmuted. It should also be known that this is something common to all metals that their matter is very close to each other, in nature, in virtue and in power.
Thus Albert the Great says:
"In the Works of Nature, I learned by my own experience, that living waters flow from a single origin. In a certain part it was gold, and in another silver and nevertheless this matter was unique but the place was different by its heat. Consequently, the difference in the place of purification will have made the difference according to the species."
Summary of all the work of Alchemy and of our Stone according to the assertions of all the Philosophers.
Plato says:
"Partisan of our Work must first dissolve the Stone. Then, coagulate because our Work is none other than to make a perfect solution and coagulation."
From where the Rosary says:
"What is not converted into water does not reach perfection. We must therefore never use any kind of commixtion and destruction in the whole regime of our Work, but only convert into permanent water whose force is spiritual blood, that is to say tincture without which we do nothing. In our operation, the body is converted into spirit, and the spirit into body. Indeed, thus mixed, they are reduced to a single thing and unite reciprocally The body incorporates the spirit by the tincture of blood, for everything that has spirit also has blood.
Everything whose root is earth and water becomes dead, that is, the earth becomes water and the qualities of water overcome it; thus is the solution of the body and the coagulation of the spirit and vice versa. They indeed have a unique operation because one does not dissolve unless the other coagulates. You therefore unite the Sun through the Moon and coagulate through the Sun because from there the effects will appear, since the lower part is pushed downwards and because the superiors naturally dominate the inferiors.
De la Hali, King and Philosopher says:
"Both, i.e., the solution of the body and the coagulation of the spirit, will be a single operation, and one does not do one without the other. The reason is that when the body and the soul are united together, each of these two acts upon its companion. When the earth and the water are united together, the water seeks to dissolve the earth by its moisture and its virtue, its intrinsic property, makes the earth more subtle than it was before; and it makes the earth like itself in the body so that it becomes water. On the contrary, the water becomes thick with the earth and becomes like the earth in density because the earth is thicker than the water."
Thus Albert says, in the Secret of Secrets:
"Know that between the solution and the coagulation of the spirit, there is no delay of time, nor difference of work since one does not take place without the other. Whatever the mode between the water and the earth, there is no different part, nor delay of time, so that one can recognize in their operations that one separates from the other; but there is the same and unique operation which is done simultaneously."
Arnaud says:
"The Work of our Stone is its dissolution, knowing that the matter of the Stone cannot be destroyed until it remains in some form. Once the first form of the body is dissolved, immediately a new form is assumed which, indeed, is black in color, fetid in smell, subtle in touch. Work. Thus the Stone dissolves in water which is called Mercury, ours and that of the Philosophers."
King Hali says:
"The composition of our magisterium is the freezing or marriage of the frozen spirit with the dissolved body; and its conjunction like its passion is made on fire. Heat is its nourishment, and the soul neither loves the body nor unites with it, not by any conjunction whatsoever, but by mutation of the two, which is done by the virtue of fire and heat, by conversion of their nature."
D'ou Morien says:
"Our magisterium is nothing but the extraction of water from the earth and vice versa, it is the return of water to the earth until the earth putrefies with its own water. And when it has been putrefied, then purified, the whole magisterium, with the help of God, will have been well conducted."
De la Plato says:
"Take our Stone and put it in thin strips, place it in our tightly closed vessel and give it plenty of light fire until it breaks. And know that the whole magisterium is nothing but to make a perfect dissolution and coagulation, that is to say first to dissolve then, so that the water freezes, to cook in the heat of the sun."
The manner of projecting follows.
How our Stone must be projected on the metals. Let the weight of one denarius be placed on ten weights of common mercury cleaned with salt and vinegar and then dried. Then put the crucible on the fire and when the mercury begins to boil and smoke, then immediately project the white medicine on the molten mercury. Then the medicine begins to melt on the surface, like oil. This oil then penetrates quickly and changes the color of the mercury which freezes in the manner of white glass. Extract from the fire this mercury thus vitrified, from which, cooled, one will take a weight which one will project on sixty weights of molten Jupiter; then immediately will appear stars which will pass quickly. Then cover the crucible well with live coals and leave in this fire for a quarter of an hour.
This is followed by the mode of projection of the Pierre au rouge.
Funds half ounce of Mercury and half ounce of Jupiter separately; then place your medicine on the molten Jupiter so that it remains a little thus mixed in the crucible so that they are incorporated well.
You must have three crucibles, one in which medicine is mixed with Jupiter, in the second there is raw Mercury, the third is empty. Then put the medicine melted with the Jupiter in the crucible and immediately throw in the Mercury, stirring well for a good mixture. Then remove everything from the fire and leave to cool while the other crucibles remain on the fire.
When the Mercury has cooled, let the medicine be thrown into an empty crucible, then, the medicine having been removed from the said crucible, pour the Mercury into it. You must always proceed thus until the medicine has coagulated the Mercury which, congealed in red glass, diaphanous and transparent, you project a weight of this red glass on forty-four of melted Jupiter and it will be a really good proportion.
Do with this one in the same order you followed before in the white medicine projection. It should be noted that if the metal is not frangible, you must add a greater quantity of imperfect body, ie Jupiter or Saturn if the projection was made on Saturn.
And you can do the same for all metals. You must know that you have to add the adjuvant of the bodies little by little and in the right proportion and quantity; if you affix too much, it will have to be removed because otherwise the imperfect and superfluous body would not remain.
Follows: Of the many-sided virtue of our Stone and its ineffable medicinal effect, then of Operation and Multiplication .
The Philosopher Menander said:
"When you have reached the end of our Work, you will not need to repeat it, because its action is made stronger by the fire which consumes all, which does not do the artificial fire which has wood and vegetables which it consumes, but it does not consume all the parts of things and leaves ashes and coals: now, the medicine of our Stone leaves nothing in things because it converts them completely from their form into their essence."
Indeed our medicine is like a spark of fire which in action is increased and increased in quantity as Hermes says. It increases and multiplies as much as necessary, so that the one who works in this way, stops this action at a certain point, out of boredom. And this is the poison of which the Philosophers have boasted, with which they have vivified the stones, of which the natures have been destroyed and they reduce them to a temperate nature. Therefore, do honor to our Peter.
Hermes says:
"When our Stone has come to an end, nothing finer will be seen."
Therefore, do not be surprised if the supercelestial bodies are incorruptible in themselves when, in the lower ones, it is found in the nature of the incorruptible and not subject to the other lower bodies. If our Stone were in the fire until the last day, it would not be consumed or transmuted, which Hermes expounds saying: When I came to his end, it was such joy to me as I never had such in my life, seeing that so much essence could be retained in these lower places without elemental matter.
O Nature, the greatest of creatures that contains what fire cannot!
How our medicine treats all ailments and infirmities and how to make use of it.
This is the way of using medicine according to all the Philosophers: If you want to use our medicine by mouth, then take the weight of two ducal florins for a pound of any confection and eat of this confection in winter the weight of a drachma. And that thing will drive away bodily infirmities of any kind, whether hot or cold. It preserves health and youth in man; and of an old man, she makes a young one, she makes fall the white hair.
Likewise, our philosophical poison instantly cures leprosy. It dissolves the phlegm, purifies the blood, sharpens the sight, and all the senses and the intelligence in an admirable way and beyond all the medicines of the Philosophers. Consequently, our medicine is invaluable, because everything has been done for man etc...
The treatise written above was transcribed from a very old book by a certain doctor staying in the famous city of Leipzig: This ancient book once belonged to Charles VI Emperor of the Romans according to whom he had our Peter prepared and accomplished it perfectly. He raised and founded many monasteries and many remarkable churches and collegiates and cathedrals etc...
End of the treatise known as Women's Labor and Children's Play