Treatise on the nature of the philosophers' egg

Composed by Bernard, Count of Treves, German

A PARIS

---

Of the nature of the egg

Certain epistle of Bernard Allemand touching the Egg of the Philosophers

Sir, with correction, it seems to me that you desire touching these things otherwise than the definition of natural things has been left, when you say that the matter of Jean le Noir cannot achieve this effect, and consequently Sulphur, according as you have practiced it, Sir, you have not heard the quality of this Sulphur, according to the essence of its matter and alteration, even the perfective matter of the aforesaid John the Black must be brought to an end, which is by natural preparations, but you propose many things which are of no use to the proposal, but as unworthy and confused did not understand the possibility of nature, the sound of the words deceived you: for it was necessary first to discern with caution what which must be done first, and why, and when, because the first who is last in resolution, is first in imposition, for by this must come the knowledge of the Sun and the Elixir, that is, by reducing this to its first principles and Elements of which it is made: you must therefore divide the compound down to the incompounds, but first you must have the knowledge of the compound, then that you reduce it to the parts put in order until you arrive at its principles, and it is the resolving knowledge, and doctrine called compositive, that is to know which conjoins what it has divided beginning with the first matter and with the principles and Elements, and are found in the compounds but the resolving doctrine begins with the compounds and are simple principles and Elements which are called the first matter, from which is made the Elixir which transmutes the bodies. How then do you think you introduce the form of the complete Elixir into matter which has this is less disposed.

Seeing that the Elixir has two being able to be made of things homogeneous and uniform in substance, like pure Mercury, to which all the substance of the fixed body remains resolved and to make volatile without any separation.

Now the intention of the Philosophers is, and always has been, and will be, to make of the body the spirit, that is, of pure Mercury, which is called philosophical, because it is made by procedure of philosophy, containing in itself dual nature.

Now since it is necessary to compose the Stone of two substances and of volatile and fixed: it is necessary first to make or draw from the union of these two Mercurys, before making the complete Elixir, and this is their Mercury, which cause perfection, and in which the whole magisterium consists, and have heard this one say that if you can by Mercury alone complete your work, you will be a very skilful inventor of the Art, which is done by the passion which it must maintain, being occult and homogeneous with his body, and it is this Mercury that they ordered to be chosen first, and even as many bodies and Mercury not that he is Mercury in all his nature, as we vulgarly understand, nor in all its substance, because it has already lost all its terrestrial and adjustable faeces with much dissipation of its fleeting wateriness, and remains pure substance by half united and conjoined with the fixed substance: for in the work, before being able to to make the true transmutatory medicine of the stones, it is necessary to sublimate the whole, not only the volatile part, but also the fixed one, then the whole being converted into spirit, the Philosophers said that it was the water of volatility by which all matter is converted into smoke, called all this stone water, as Socrates testifies, saying in the Peat, if you do not reduce everything to water, you will not succeed in the work, because the body must be occupied by the flame of fire, that it may be destroyed and made weak with the water in which it is, and Consolies said, know, O investigators of this Art, that every body is dissolved with the spirit, in which it is mingled, and with which no doubt he is made spiritual.

Now when this spirit sublimates itself, it is called water, as it foretold, which water washes itself and cleanses itself: since all substance is very subtle, as it was foretold, rises leaving what corrupted her; for Mercury putrefies in the work, by which the body is converted into spirit, not only of its sulphurities, but also of all earthliness, and of the large and subtle aqueous parts, coming from viscosity, attached by strong mixture, and becomes the Mercury of the Philosophers, of which Geber speaks.

The consideration of the perficient thing is the pure substance of Mercury, so much so that in elevation one and the other rises like smoke by previous fusion, and because also then it melts, and coagulates. by the cold, and devoid of superfluidity, it washes and imbibes its water, that is to say by the prepared spirit which came from the same germ, and it is the Philosophical dissolution which is done with the dissolving fire , first prepared as required, made and invigorated, which the Philosopher Mirandus attests, saying, the body must be liquefied with its solvent, in order to alter it from its corporeal nature, until by the destructive dissolution, the body is made spiritual and subtle.

Now because this Mercury has in itself a fixative nature which is joined to it, as also because of its double nature, the Philosophers have called it permanent and persevering water in fire, because the volatile part is not without its body, with which it is dissolubly mingled and both are inseparably made one, which naturally or of its nature is not permanent in fire, because one must not be proud of the sublimated Mercury, nor so dissolved, seeing that the whole is fugitive, but to the calcined after dissolution, as the exposer says in the Light of lights, being sublimated, he is fugitive from the fire, and white in his nature but while by his coagulative he is coagulated and calcined, he is fixed and retained, and this coagulative is the body which is hidden from the Mercury of the Philosophers: when it comes to be born, this Mercury is called milk, because it fixes and coagulates by its hidden body, and is made one with the Mercury, and a in substance, and so coagulates itself and not another, and is known of the melted wax, because in the commixtion they are made entirely one without separation, to last forever: and both in the same substance complete the rest, and that which is set on fire pass from nature to nature, until at the same vessel in form of matter it is converted into true medicine, and this is its last disposition, which looks a lot like human generation.

Now your matter has not yet attained that property by which it can be called philosophical Egg, and by which disposition it can in the last resort be transformed into a complete Elixir, because all your matter is not entirely brought into round spirit, circulated by deuë circulation, but it is a body of self fixed, not fleeing, and a fugitive spirit only by itself without the fixed, from which it appears that this is not an Egg, since one rejects the rest.

Since the generation of the great Elixir is done vaporously and permanently in the air, how do you think you can achieve the end of enemies too distant in nature, because never the body, when it allows the spirit to separate without its nature, nor the spirit when it rises without its dryness, cannot be converted into Elixirs, because vaporously they cannot mix with each other the cause for which the Philosophers called their Mercury Egg, is also this, because just as the egg is a round circular thing, containing in itself two natures in one substance, the white and the yolk, and draws from itself another thing which has soul, and life and generation , that is, when a chicken comes out of it, so also here the Mercury contains in itself two things of one nature, body and spirit, and draws from itself the soul and the life while all is spiritual, d 'where afterwards the generation of the true Elixir is made, which made Mirandus say, this Egg draws from itself the life that it has, then after the soul and generation.

And said Plato, in the Egg of the Philosophers there are things which being entirely mixed and putrid become converted into spirit, for it is alive and not dead, it is therefore this Egg which, being set on fire by a single decoction, without touching hands, makes a chicken by a single disposition, which completes itself, and confirms itself, and this is of the hermaphrodite nature, because it is like mixed and female, and of complexion hermaphrodite, as the Philosopher confirms saying also, so the seed of the plant is like the impregnation, which is a mixture of male and female, and just as in the egg there is a force to beget a chicken , and similarly its matter which is necessary to it until it comes out of it, so to ours, and just as the female lays an egg in an hour, and the seed of the plant, so also we our egg , so that an Elixir is generated, from which it is easy to see that an Elixir cannot be generated except from things which have in them the Hermaphrodite complexion, as it is seen in the aforesaid Egg.

But Albertus tries to confirm the complexion of this Egg, in the third of the minerals thus saying in the chapter of Sulphur, it is necessary that the hot and the dry are joined to the humid and cold in the same complexion, and this complexion is Hermaphrodite, as it is seen from plants, I write to you the determination of this Egg with the declaration, lest you fail in the near matter of which it must make a perfect Elixir, as a certain from Carcassonne calling himself Master Tolquet, assured to Léotard that he had seen your matter in a certain vessel in the form of Mercury mingled with the body, and being as if half frozen, which he says, as if in vituperosity, not to be an Egg, however much he says the truth that you have gone astray, but he, in truth redarguing you, opines without knowledge of the facts, except however his reverence, and those who will follow him.

I have known of his intention, and by his sublimation, and the water which he believes to draw from it, and which he assures with great ignorance that it is the vinegar of the Philosophers: but in truth, since nature and all its hope contradict him, his words contain no truth, but distant and alienated he is from Philosophy by superfluous fantasies, not considering the forms of this transmutation, nor the Elements, nor what is real, but what is fantastic, nor not not also considering that the same forms can have their being transmutative of the Philosophical matter and of those who are in the Philosophical matter, and not of the foreign ones, as must consider the real Philosopher, that what is in the matter is there only of its nature, and is real: similarly he must consider the movement as the efficient according as it moves the matter, and the form according to the being which is in the matter, and also the end according to what is the limit of the movement, according as matter moves it, and likewise matter itself as far as it can be the matter of the philosophical form, and according to what is the subject of the form, and according to the being that the form has in matter, and thus the way of doing things of philosophizing men is known, but Tolquetus was not of such consideration, not changing his complexion, however much that fraternal correction is a work of bodily mercy, because by the bodily man gains the mercy of the body; but the spiritual gains the life of the soul, however when it does not serve the obstinate, those who resist such correction, they become demons, not knowing the defect or its fault, whereby such people must be left as tax collectors, according to the sentence of our Saviour, Math 18, those who fall through ignorance are less far from the truth than Monsieur Turquet, even though you ignore the terms of the art, and the form of the matter close to the generation of the Elixirs, or of medicine, however you have the matter congruent with that, and the order congruent, if you understand well the form of the preparations, which I have given you sufficiently with its qualities and necessary causes, and how they are made, and because the property of the work by which nature is led and drawn to perfection, is in its matter by nature's own movement, rejoice, because you may find it, not by doctrine, but by own indignation of the same nature of the determined movement, this is why it is necessary to consider the movement according to that the matter moves in the form of relation you can regulate the matter by a natural movement, because such a movement being proper and determined, always tends to introduce the proper species into the proper matter, from which necessarily follows multiplication by similar species in the same matter.

Now since the virtue of the Elixir is engendered formatively from the property of matter, either combated by unctuous humidity, or else from matter moist by terrestrial dryness, which is the same thing, you must notice that such passion or combat proceeds the transmutation of substance into the form of complete Elixir which is to say, that the dry and the moist first endure together, because both together come to one which is homogeneous and natural generative , without ever separating, as you can see from the nature and constitution above declared.

Now the egg is nothing other in its great quantity than a watery moist, enduring and suffering under the terrestrial dryness, thus also the perfect Elixir is nothing other than Mercury, which has endured a very great heat and dryness. of which the Mercury thus suffered will be the near matter of the Elixir, by whose experience it is found that it is not unless it liquefies and dissolves by strong ignition: and being thus united it becomes coagulates in the cold into a metallic fusible stone, it therefore appears that Mercury is the close matter of the Elixir by the passion it receives from the dry earthly adust, for further declaration answering your verses, that your desire is to know that the penultimate of the work, generally understood in all the degrees to which we will try to arrive, is the purity of the matter and perfect straightness, by which however to know by purity and straightness our egg is perfect because then the simple nature rejoices and ends in the simple pure nature in homogeneity and proportion of the Elements.

Now the cause which makes some people think that the composition of this egg is impossible, has been either very strong construction of the body, or the difficult resolution, because what is difficult to build, dissolves with difficulty, but if they knew the natural composition they would also know the resolution, and that the artificial construction can be done, but by a natural course: By what since they are unaware of it they must condemn their undue operations by which they want to arrive by corruption and generation at something else, such have tried that the body is of very strong composition, but they still do not know how strong it is, because if they had come to that term, they would know how the egg is made of the corruption of the body, which is the cause for which such have not well known the fundamentals of nature, rejecting the superfluous, and increasing that which is diminished, and not only the superfluity itself and the diminution which is hidden and which is seen, and therefore the very nature which is the perfect root and essence, nor the convenience of the work, the property of which is to conceal that which manifests it, and to manifest that which is occult, that which they may know by mortifying and vivifying, of which things one sees so much the corruption and infection of metals, that likewise the right composition of our egg, by which note that when the Philosophers say that there is nothing superfluous in this egg, they mean that it should not be handled and removed from the hands, but which must be left to the decoction of its breadmaking alone, it appears in the decoction of the egg when it turns hard, or else in its inveteration, which should be noted, and when they say then afterwards that in the aforesaid egg there is no diminution, they demonstrate by this that nothing must be added to it, since it contains all that is required for our magisterium, therefore this stone is a perfect egg of two substances of one nature, which is made namely of body and spirit in unity of essence or nature, and in this conjunction of resurrection the body is made spirit like the spirit itself, and are made as one, as water mingled with water never able to be separated, having no diversity in them namely of three, which are spirit, soul and body, without any separation, which is seen even in the unity of the Trinity, in God the Father, and the Fus, and the Holy Spirit, who are one in God himself, with distinction without diversity in substance, whose words we can directly know only the ancient Philosophers who had this part , have been divined by this divine art of the Appearance of God in human nature or flesh, namely Christ, and his unity with God through the abundance of the Holy Spirit, how much indiscriminately and confusedly they have known this, of which I am of the opinion that one notices the truth and the figures of things, what all those who have been true artists of this divine and glorious art have been able to put in God the Trinity and unity, however in the Trinity with distinction, but without diversity in him, but in this Stone is assigned Trinity in unity, and on the contrary with distinction without diversity.

I do not see that there is, for those who will look closely and who will know, an example in all the world more similar than this one, for the assignment of the Trinity in God.

Now here relates what is in St. Augustine to the first of the Trinity and of the soul, namely that there is in the soul, these three, which nevertheless are one, namely memory, intelligence , and dilection or will, which is the most beautiful and true, but only by chance some contradiction, but not in this place, I firmly believe that if any infidel knew this Art well, he would then necessarily be faithful in the Trinity of God and would put knowledge in our Lord Jesus Christ Son of God, that if he does this I believe that it comes only from a fear that he has in himself of his sect, and in the first law given by d others, let him not be punished in the same way, for seeing the Trinity in God, by this very occult and very precious stone, as Hermes, Plato and the other ancient Philosophers saw, he is not found therefore no like comparison, and there is neither inquisition nor subtlety, nor utility, nor treasure like this, seeing that the soul of him who knows these things, and his body are made free in this world, awaiting the beatitude of the future century, being able to transfer good works to God after his death, and being conjoined again to his creator on the last day, and being happy with him, to return to the subject of the usefulness of the Stone, we will say that never Mind and body will not come to the foretold union, as Raso testifies in the beginning of his book, until both are cleansed.

It also says, so that you may understand it better, that its previous terms and dispositions have great agreement with what is generated in the egg, before the dispositions are made, by which it can turn into a complete Elixir, know that the aforesaid, namely the spirit and the body, do not unite well with each other, in order to be able to demonstrate their virtues, by which the perfect operation is effected, if both are not well defined, for the body will not take the spirit, nor the spirit the body, to make the spiritual corporeal, nor the corporeal spiritual, unless all filth and filth are removed, which being done the body embraces the spirit, and the spirit the body, and from them is made the perfect operation, if the fixion overcomes the great volatility, but if the very great fixion is overcome by the great volatility, the shape of the egg does not complete, being only a body which withdraws towards the spirit, and here is the penultimate term of our Mercury which is called Egg, containing in itself what is required for the perfection of our magisterium, to which there is nothing superfluous, nor any diminution of the perfection of the Egg, but that is all that is necessary for the production of chicken and medicine, from which the artist of fine understanding will be able to notice that in this magisterium there are three things which show order, first, that preparation precedes conjunction, second, that the preparation of either is not perfection, but only a disposition to conjunction, by which it takes the form of Stone or of Sulfur or of our Mercury which are one in the Egg, of which we have treated above, and on the contrary perfection is not simply preparation, but an immediate induction of form, which can complete our work, thirdly that in all the time of their conjunction their union being perfect, they are forever found pure and clean, and stripped of all superfluities, from which one can easily see that at the time of their purity us are made both before and after for the straightness of the stone, or generation of our egg, and not in front, nor beyond.

But if enough to prepare the matter well, so that it is not only a puree of all addible superfluities, but also of all earthiness, both coarse and subtle, attached by strong mixing to the aqueous parts coming from viscosity.

Now this purification takes place when the body turns into spirit and the spirit into body, so that in the procedure of the work it becomes converted until very prompt nature has found a permanent state, in which it ends its movement, which is the form of the generation of the egg, and then nature begins another movement to form the perfect medicine, again corrupting our Egg from the form, and introducing into it another form of perfect medicine, and this has passed from degree to degree, but the sapience of a good Artist must diligently inquire into the cause why the purified stone ends in solution, and the cause why it does not come sooner and more severely to its intention , and because from the opposite causes flow the opposite affections, and that by one of the opposites, we know the rest: it must be noticed that the proximate cause by which the purified stone is completed by solution, is a very great similarity from one to the other and from the spirit to the body, and from the body to the spirit, not only in matter, but also in complexion, qualities and natural properties, for the more the body approaches complexion of the spirit, and on the contrary so much the more quickly do they become one, and are transfigured into an egg, because each one desires what is closer to his complexion, and because the body is very warm in the depths of nature, so much the hotter and purer Mercury is, so much the more is it penetrating, and blends better, and unites better with it, so that of two complexions, there is made a single compound in its simplicity, for that which is hot is digestive in some way similar to hot and humid resolves, and the colder it is, having no acute heat, the less does it penetrate deep into the body and later dissolve , and therefore conjoining later, or even later because of matter; and from the quantity and quality of this matter the species do not separate from the species, but because of the following form, that is why the Artist must fully know the matter of nature, its quantity and quality, since the things predicted are doubtless to him alone known.

Now we are ignorant of nature's own instruments, by which she acts mediately in matter for the introduction which is the formation of the Egg, since no agent, whether natural or artificial, can act without them. own instruments and determined, as you see, for what nature in the generation of all things works with digesting and altering, and mundifying heat, as with her own instrument, according to which the nature of all things requires, how then if you ignore this instrument, do you think you are forming an Egg, by no means: art indeed takes the filthy spirits of nature, and conjoins them with the pure and spiritual ones of nature, and by sublimating them, elevates and cleanses them like nature, and stripping of all bad sulfur, and in this stripping nature, acting and operating there, equalizes the qualities of the Elements, and the proportions of them in the mixture, how much we ignore such proportions not being necessarily, nor in our power to know this, nor do we desire to know, being known only to nature alone, for that nature rectifies itself, cooking the Elements, and putting them to proposition of its kind, being thy rectitude of nature, and consistent in the equality of its Elements, and proportions of them: Now since art cannot equal its elements which are in nature, being proper to it to bring the Elements to its proportion, it appears that it suffices that art knows and operates with nature, and by aiding it by nature, so that art may be aided by it. Now art operates with nature, and nature with art in the transmutation of the nature of metals, when therefore they are cleansed by sublimations, and then wishing to flee from the fire art, the orphan seers, immediately administers to them a pure fixed nature, so that they may be strengthened by it, and the virtues of the spirits which are in them elementary and celestial for the proposition of the same nature, and thus Nature converts them into clean and fixed bodies, and not the art, if not serving as an organ or instrument: so that the nature of bodies will forever dominate over the nature of minds, and by this miraculous industry art imitates nature, hastening and accelerating its works, but for what art behaves thus with nature, in the place of the passions, in the operation and generation of the stone, one finds in its superabundance the medium and the defect: you will see why the Philosophers order to know the weights of the one and the other, by seeking the proportion of the virtues of the best, because the property of art, when it feeds its stone, strives to observe four points in education, namely, how, rather, and when it is necessary, and how much it is necessary, and how it must be done, now these terms are no less deducible to actions and passions, if we look at the debilitation or reinforcement of nature with which the art operates, and by the dispositions of the art the intrinsic things are governed which caused the Philosophers to recite with measure the natures of the fires to the magisterium of the decoction, looking at the average nature, for what such a virtue being considered in itself is a certain mediation and conjecture of it, for what it looks at the milieu and the milieu operates.

More for what to the rectitude of Nature supposes an operative disposition, washing them in the expoliation of the corrupting Sulphur, you must dispose your matter to melt it, otherwise it will not be mundified, nor will it be rectified, and consequently will not cannot take the form of an Egg, whence Arnaud de Villeneuve said in his new testament, that the Stone must first be known of what kind it is, which being known must monify it by ablutions and fusions, but as the matter takes fusions first it rots, since it has the substance of liquefaction, it can in no way be drawn by another faction, hence the aforementioned Arnaud au Rosaire says, that if it is not putrid, it cannot be melted, and will not dissolve.

And Morien said, Know that after the putrefaction there is Azoth which is interpreted substance of liquefaction, by which the most high God and the benign Creator has created the great, and completed the composition which has been sought, but it will not take not true putrefaction so far, if it is not first divided into elementary substances, since in it are found the putrefactive virtues which are called principles of all transmutable bodies, or generative and corruptive, because all things take qualities from the elements , various alteration tending to generation mediately or immediately, or as lazy or distant according to the strength or debility of the putrefactive, corrupting and generative virtue, whence your industry must seek this art to the elements of the permanent stone, for what, as said Arnault de Villeneuve, our science consists in the science of the four elements, and in the equal conversion of them, for what everything. who is in the world is there not by sight, but by virtue, and as much as their separation is necessary, he adds that the same elements by distillation and putrefaction will reiterate and unite, because by this means the whole body becomes spiritual, and the first material of which it was first made and of the four Elements, although later there is made in the operation of the work another first material of their due conjunction very close to this metallic kind, from which it appears that what we hear in the nature of the stone comes from its Elements for what it is necessary that you know the first matter, the close and the very close, because all the Philosophers put that this preparation is true, and that nothing is known except from its principles, and we see the proof of this in the second of Physics, that to hear and to feel or to estimate in all sciences, is only of its principles, and causes, and of their Elements, but for that the virtue of matter must be proportioned to the forces according to being, by which in the act it is perfected, by which you must order its operation according to this form, to which it must first be disposed or approached , for the form enters into every sort of matter arranged and which approaches it, but since there are as many degrees of matter as there are orders of forms according to nature, consider by what form and of what degree you are thinking sublimate your matter, and following that arrange it first by proper operation, so that it may be made suitable, to take the aforesaid form by which it is to be completed and sublimated.

Now this ability or approach to the first, first conceives by proper and natural operation, since there is perfection in it, as I remember the other said above according to its degree, because matter, although it has been sufficiently prepared by the preparation of the first or second degree, cannot take form, if not conjoined to it the preparations of the third, which dispose the first, even though by the preparations of the second degree of sublime perfection, it has been made very close to conceive the form of the third degree, seeing that one cannot come from an extreme to an extreme, except by a medium, because as the operations dispose the matter the form of the first degree to the effects and operations by which it acquires the form of the second degree, and thus they enable or dispose it by operations, by which it takes its form from the third and from the great Elixir, when it is therefore in the third degree it is the great Elixir, and when you want to have the form of the third degree with that of the second, and that you do not have that of the first degree, work as much as you want to make this matter close to such a degree and to the greatest, you toil in vain thinking to give it the last form of the Elixir, because I cannot write you all the things which are necessary, leaving them to your judgment, because the spiritual things declare enough how you must regulate your work by the degrees of the forms, and according to the nature of each degree prepare the matter of nature, so that by the preparation of the one it will be disposed to the preparation of the other, until you come to the end of your desire, following its degrees, for you would not give your work so little time as many fools believe, for this is against reason and against the movement of nature, believe the warnings of the Philosophers who have seen the depths of nature, for Hippocrates says, time is short because of the age, the experience is long because of the time, whereupon says Geber, although few and mainly of the ancients had this science, because he said old and not young, for what we are impatient, wanting to have it in a short time, and that is why he concludes at the book entitled the investigation of the perfect magisterium, not that he intends that time is short, because he says elsewhere, it is the medicine which a very long time has occupied, or which the space of a very long time anticipates, and in sum chapter of medicine of the third degree says, that for greater industry in the administration of this matter and the perfection of preparation that it takes a long time for the accomplishment of truth, although the medicine of this third degree is not diversified from the medicine of the second order, except in its creation by the other very subtle degrees of sublimative preparation, and by a long labor, and on the other hand Mercurial coagulation, for it is very difficult to coagulate the igneous humidity, which only happens to the Artist very laboriously with depth of industry, all of which things denote a long time, also on this the Philosophers exhort to have patience belatedly: that therefore the impatient leave the work, because all action has its movement and determined time: And the master Arnault de Villeneuve says in his Rosary, it is necessary that ' our medicine be accustomed longer on the fire, than the child we feed, or it must be remarked that longer is more, than more than a long time, which is nevertheless more than the brief;

Medicine therefore is not made in a few days, nor in months, nor in a nutshell, since it takes longer to tame it by fire and nourish it there: Now this is said because of the mutations which are the best and principal of the operation and of a very long labor, as one sees in the nature of Mercury, by the exhalation of the very subtle parts, and by the conservation of the humidity of the grosser parts which is completed by repeated sublimation until the great and perfect Elixir is made, seeing that our Mercury is of viscous and fine substance, as experience shows when beaten with the imbibition and mixing which it has and which it demonstrates the viscosity, because of the great adhesion that it makes in its parts, and by the aspect of its weight one notices its density, and because of the very strong composition can be done only by long space of time and great industry, which also experience teaches, and this same cause of freezing or inspissation of the Moon, which is perfected by repeated sublimation with the difficulty of handling it, seemed good to be noticed, since it is of the same nature of body, especially since by decoction all bodies take origin from it, and can be drawn from all bodies by a certain reincrudation, from which we see that the mutations of this labor are very long , and of as great difficulty to handle it as there is in sublimating it by making a very great fire, and how much that the Philosophers divide its magisterium into several operations according to the degree of the forms and their diversities, however it does not there is only one in the formation of the Egg, but in the reiteration of its action, there is always diversity in the movement, and the colors of later separation and fortification of the fire, and such diversity in the work performs various operations, although in truth there is only one and only one way of doing things, as the Philosopher expressly says in his book, where he explains the figure of the lion hunt, which agrees the intention of Morien, saying that the magisterium is only a drawing of water from the earth, and a mixture of water on the earth, until the earth rots and cleanses, so that 'after it dissolves and is made entirely spiritual with the spirit, and this then is called Egg, and the Mercury of the Philosophers, on account of which Morien adds, when it is cleansed by the help of God , all the magisterium will be done, because it means that the body dissolves into spirit, and it is this solution that you have alleged above, which is done immediately after its entire purification of all corrupting things, because such purification does not take place.

Fact only by the virtue of putrefaction being only a great heat of spirit, which the body corrupts with a strange body-composition, and putrifies it penetrating to the depths of it, without ever being able to be separated , and so by such putrefaction and elixation the body is reduced to the complexion of Mercury which is different from that of the body, and in order that you may encode the nature of the corrupting and putrefying, it must be observed that it must necessarily be that what is at dissolving and putrifying Mercury overcomes in force the heat of the work in the complexion of this body, and when the heat which is the complexion of the body itself, for what it is of foreign complexion, and by corrupting its complexion it converts into an egg, that is, into hot and humid Mercury, as conqueror, whereby what in the beginning was dry and fixed, is made spiritual flying, and what first was in the form of metal, is a form of Mercury : but such mercury is not found on the earth, except that which is in the perfect body, from which it is drawn by putrefaction, by heat of foreign complexion, as it appears by its definition which is thus defined by famous authors.

The putrefaction is corruption of the own humidity that is to the Mercury that is to the body by foreign heat; more it is good that the Mercury putrefies and does not resolve, nor consume the humidity of the metal, but that remaining in it it corrupts it by natural qualities disposing it, by which it is made contrary metal, it therefore changes the complexion which suits the metal in that which it could in no way make, while the humidity of the metal informed by natural heat would remain there.

Therefore it is necessary that first the heat of the spirit with its tail, like a Scorpion, corrupts by pricking the natural heat of the same body, and for that which the bearer of the heat or of the sulfur is spirit, that is to say the Mercury holding as linked the sulfur with it for the complexion of the body; you will see why it is necessary that our Mercury first corrupts the complexion of him, so that our Mercury first corrupts the complexion of him, for demonstration of which, because of my dearest Jean, the bearer of this very hidden science or art, I will reserve for you as much as it will be possible for me more ample secrets, estimating that you will always observe secrets, hiding them as under the filth of manure. I therefore say that in all putrefactives there must be an extraneous heat, corrupting the own natural heat.

Now I say that this natural heat which is proper to all metals, by which they receive their complexion, or else this sulfur which is. the same thing from which they receive their congealing according to their kind, and which is found in its metal-like complexion, but the foreign heat is called that sulphur, which is complexed and brought into the complexion of our corrupting and putrefying dung, which is interpreted Mercury hot and humid with manure, whose complexion is still natural and proper, it is however foreign to that of the sun or the moon, although it can be brought to the equality of the complexion of the Elixir of sun or moon, by leavens, as by strange heat, dominating over his complexion, for the complexion of our heat of manure and of Mercury abounds in humidity, but the complexion of the sun and the moon having regard to the manure in fixity, wherefore, when the heat of the manure is joined with that of the sun or moon, it begins to act upon him with his moisture, corrupting the natural heat of the sun or moon, and therefore his whole complexion by its longer heat, which first was coagulated in the form of sulphur, within the species of sun or moon entirely, in very liquid substance of Mercury; transmuting that which touches it, as has been said, if the forces of the manure are stronger than the heat of the sun or the moon, for it does not happen that the sun or the moon putrefy while it remains informed by natural heat, that is why ü the heat of the manure sulfur must be more powerful in acting and corrupting the natural liquefactive moisture of the sun or the moon because ü in no way corrupts the other if it does not excite it , although it is of the same kind humid and hot, like air and fire, or quite the opposite, like hot and cold, water and fire.

This is also the cause why all things are in a certain corrupting motion, for what natural things have contradicted, and some surpass this contrariety, and some at all contrary, and for what these surpass in virtue, they act continually in it, and always suffer in it, and this similarity is the cause that the life of animals is commonly shortened and their duration which always tends to corruption, and that is why in animate things there is no no faculty to abide and live forever, and it is for this that the heat of the sulfur of sun or of the moon being overcome takes contrariety from the heat of the sulfur of dung, and from here the substance putrefies and corrupts, and convert itself into the nature of manure itself, as in natural rot: our manure therefore changes the complexion of the metal into that of an egg, and into liquid mercury, having the qualities disposed to be converted into the sun or the moon, which is not would never do, if it were not first dissolved by complexioned moist heat: dissolve it therefore embracing it with the nature and heat of manure, and the Mercury which the Philosophers in their secrets have called manure, for what its natural humidity at because of its grease, it is preserved longer by putrefaction in its own heat, this is why it generates putrefied metal, in which such humidity remains for a long time, and for what it is preserved longer, it dries out more difficultly, and later separates from the dissolved substance, which is seen in its fusion, for it is radical to metals of a moist kind, like manures to other things, according to nature, as seen here, for what it is to them joined to the root, and to admirable operations, even infinite, which the Philosophers have concealed under the manure of horse and abject things, as also of salts, alums, and sharp things, but whatever Be that as it may, I say of generosity, that earth and water are largely of the number of passive material things, which two are cold, and that cold cannot coagulate or fatten except by aiding and constricting the parts of matter , and not by putting into it the substantial form, as does the com-plexional heat, wherefore they must introduce a strange heat, as happens in leaven water, being essentially cold, but warm to the touch, similarly cold, but similarly hot to the touch, water poured by 1st, ashes is hot, for what it has the heat which operates in it by the ashes, for what it is in the ashes as in other things inflamed, which the fire has operated for a long time, or by heat there is more or less hot, according to the diversity of the operation of heat in it, because of which also the Sun and the Moon, and mercury are generated in places putrefactive, for what the natural heat of evaporation is there, which gives body to the humidity which exalts it, hear in the same way what I said of our magisterium and of the secrets of nature, however the knowledge of this belongs only to Philosophers, or to those to whom Philosophy serves as a gifted mother, for what she only reveals her secrets to her children, you say more in your letter and in your questions, if you can come to perfection by him alone, which is to be understood of the aforesaid and not of the other, for what being entirely prepared he causes perfection, for the Philosophers say if by him alone and that by mingling the body by this the Mercury must be stripped of all sulfur, of which it is made or composed, until there remains nothing there but the substance pure and simple, and is called simple, because it has no more sulfur which corrupts it, which first it had of its composition, and which however much there was was none the less of its proportion, wherefore it is said separated by art from such Sulfur to be made pure simple Mercury without no strange composition, and Mercury because of its simple heat of homogeneous fixity on simple fire merges, exhausting itself without any adduction with the preceding solution, for such Mercury is partly volatile and partly fixed, this which is seen in that it can only be sublimated by great fire, sometimes into liquid Mercury which is good, sometimes into a resplendent and coagulated body which is even better, sometimes into white powder which is very good, depending on whether it is more humid or drier, or what happens between this according to the various passions of the complexional dry heat, and in this carve those who think that it is only raw Mercury ending without any body, and those who still think that it is to the body have not yet attained the perfect intention, however much they have the entrance to it, the property of which is to withdraw from the fire with all its substance, or with all the fixed that remains, the everything being made homogeneous and inseparable, as one cannot separate water mixed with water, when you say by Geber, that it is necessary to freeze the purer part and leave the rest, you believe that half of the The water will ferment, we must soon be of the nature of the Philosophers, if you wish to hear their words, following the possibility of nature. But Geber declares like the others, the substances of the perfections by hearing the terms of perfection, the substances have reached, and when they say that its effect is to freeze something and leave the rest, they mean matter which has reached the term of purity by which the solution of the body is made to form the Egg, or when the body is dissolved and sublimated in spirit by the first sublimation of any sublimation or elevation of the body which is done by fire, is not yet formed egg because it is very liquid, but it is necessary to remove from it some humor by repeated sublimation without faeces, so that what is more radical in it by only sublimation turns into sublimated white powder: and that what is wetter therein, first be sublimated and guarded, for what it is liquefaction or sweat is returned to it as it enters to dye, but what is this Philosophical matter, is it by dissolving in water: certainly not , especially since the Philosophers care not for waters adhering to the one who touches them, but for those which go to the surface, having with them the terrestrial inseparably mixed, but moistening nothing, as Mercury does of the egg.

This matter therefore does not want anything else added to it than what is of it, because it has everything it needs. Now we do not see the inceration of this humidity that the earth is based on because of the strong union that it has deserved in the work of the mixing of nature. Now the manner of making them join is done by accommodating the qualities by the mutual action of icelles and passion, and conjoining them as much as it will be enough by the least parts.

END