They who by Experiments have most diligently enquired into the Origin of Bodies, and their peculiar Powers and Properties, are the only Men who have discovered sure Methods of acquiring a true Knowledge of these Things: And whenever the Lovers of natural Knowledge enumerate the Instruments of this Science, they universally agree that Chemistry has done the greatest Service, in most industriously promoting such Discoveries: And when they come carefully to examine the most celebrated Writers in this Art, they plainly perceive, that the most ancient Alchemists far surpassed the rest in their Accounts of the Nature of Things. Of this Geber is an Instance, and the Writers nearest to him; for they are content to describe, in the plainest manner, such Things only as they had discovered by their Art; to improve which was their great Application, having no other Design in view. And indeed no other Men whatever have so strictly and obstinately labour’d in the Search after natural Things, or have taken such great Pains to turn Matter, thro’ all the various Modes of Enquiry, as the Alchemists. This is what will be readily granted by all those who read the Hermetic Writers, when they openly relate common Discoveries: But, on the contrary, when these Writers treat of the Grand Arcanum (or Secret of the Wise) they are accused of making a bad Use of their Knowledge, out of a Desire to conceal it, as if they intended, on that Occasion, not to be understood. They are said to deal in Paradoxes, to write in a strange manner, perfectly foreign to all that is known, and their Style is swell’d with hyperbolical and sublime Expressions; which makes them be exploded as Men out of their Senses, fabulous, false, and Liars: For whilst they affect to write in the gravest Terms, and are rich in Promises, they so cover the Thing they are treating of in Obscurity and Darkness, that they seem unwilling the Secret should be reveal’d. And on this account it is, that very many wise Men are of Opinion, that what the Alchemists promise, is a Thing impossible both to Nature and Art, and therefore count them unworthy the Perusal of Philosophers, as well as undeserving of the Name. But it is a Maxim, That it is safer to credit an Artist in his own Art, than one that is an utter Stranger to it; and consequently it is rash to condemn what the Alchemists have defined to be possible; especially, since these Chemists openly declare, that their Writings are to be weighed in the Balance of the most certain Laws of Nature, which have been discovered with the greatest Evidence by the Events of Things; (that is, by exact and repeated Experiments) and they desire not to be credited, whenever they produce any Thing contrary to the Powers of Nature truly known by Experiments. Moreover they alledge, that they express themselves in such an obscure manner, only to keep profane Persons away from their Mysteries, which are unfolded to such as are initiated in them; and so that it was necessary that Things strange, obscure, and often false, should be mixed and interpolated with what is sincere, clear, and true in their Writings.

For my part, upon looking into chemical Matters, and perusing the Writings of the Alchemists, I have found them all of the same Mind and Meaning as to the following Particulars: That Metals are naturally generated in their Veins, are nourished, grow, and multiply like other natural Things, each in their proper Place: That the Aliments or Nourishment of Metals, which before are of a foreign Nature to them, are, by the genital Power of the Metallic Seed, converted into a truly Metallic Nature; so that by this seminal Power alone they lose their former, and receive a new Property by the sole cherishing of the pregnant Warmth; for they will have all these Things to be effected entirely by the same Means: That as the Seeds of Animals and Plants change the Aliments they receive into their own Nourishment, so the vivificating Seed of growing Gold, having got a proper Food, in a fit Matrix, by the Help of a suitable and convenient Heat, digests the same into its own particular Nature: Therefore by that Means, according to a Law prescribed to subterraneous Things, they determine that true Gold is always produced by Length of Time out of a Matter of a different Nature from Gold: For having subdued its Aliment by its own Force, it grows, by vital Increase, into a Matter like to it, so long as those four Conditions that are absolutely required attend it. Upon pursuing their Researches into Nature with more Accuracy, they discovered that the Metals which are produced, and especially Gold, are very closely confined within a very solid and pure Stone, which is on every Side so very carefully closed up, that no Passage leading to or from the Metal can be discerned. The Matrix of the growing Metal is thick, hard, impenetrable, without Mixture, closed up on all Parts, and resembles Glass. There is nothing more hard to understand, than to discern the Manner how the solid Substance of the Metal could penetrate or force itself thro’ the ponderous Mass of the hard Stone, into the Veins that are found pregnant with Metal and loaded with it. Nor is it less difficult to conceive by what Way the same Metal secretly passes into those concealed Places, if it was liquid in its first Origin, as it is highly probable that it was. And thus the genuine Matrix of Metal is known; the Heat of the Metallic Mines is also known: It seldom equals the Warmth of a Man in Health, but often sinks below the 66ᵗʰ Degree in the Scale of Farenheitius’s Thermometer. Hence they who are versed in these Mysteries direct, That the breeding Matter of the Arcanum should be inclosed in a pure Glass Vessel, and cherish’d with a Majal Heat; which we find, by Experience, to be of 50 Degrees. And this has been found out to be at a Medium throughout the Year, by the most exact Observations; which we owe to the industrious Care of Cruquius. The Food of the Metal remains yet more obscure as to what is that seminal, proliferous and genital Matter. Most of these Philosophers say, That Quicksilver is the common Matter of all Metals: That this being changed by the Power of the vital Seed, gives a Metal which is defined or determined according to the peculiar Property of the seminal Efficacy: That every Metal, when the Quicksilver and this Metallific Power (which they call Sulphur) are maturely and, as it were, thoroughly boil’d and concocted, is brought to a perfect Species of each such Metal. And from hence, That every Metal is again resolved into these two Principles, Mercury and Sulphur. But that there is an original Flaw or Blemish inherent in Quicksilver from its first Production, that wonderfully grows up with it, and is intimately concreted to it, and therefore not without the greatest Difficulty to be separated from it; and consequently the Quicksilver wou’d not be very simple, nor free, but is by that strange Matter inherent in it, of a definite Nature, and therefore wou’d hardly suffer itself to be obsequious to the particular Virtue of the Metallic Seed, and be drawn into the single Nature of one Metal: But if by a most difficult Art, the Quicksilver be thoroughly purged of that foreign Blemish or Foulness, then it would become liquid, metallic, most weighty, and most simple; neither by any Art or Nature divisible into different Things; and in which the vivified Seed of every dissolved Metal wou’d most perfectly multiply itself; in which the Gold itself dissolving, being cherish’d and maturated, wou’d be the last so much sought for, and so much celebrated Reward of the Labour.

When I found that the chief Persons of the Art agreed in these Principles for a long Time, I have endeavour’d to learn by Experience, by what Artifice a pure unmix’d Mercury might be obtained? Whether it cou’d be extracted out of Metals? What is that other Part of the Metal that is apt to force under its Yoak the free Quicksilver, or Mercury? I am glad to give an Account of what I have discovered; not that I pretend to teach the Art, which I am as far from as any one; but I will faithfully relate some laborious Experiments, and which are so very certain, that they may justly pass for true. Others will not need to repeat them, but may safely make use of these as true upon Occasion. And a diligent Artist, by assuming (or supposing) these Experiments, may apply his Mind farther to others, in order to promote the Study of Chemistry the more. It were to be wish’d, that every Man directed his private Labours to the public Good. Let the first Experiment be this: