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xxvi he did not discover it in that Author’s Writings, but was obliged to an Angel, as he says, for revealing it to him. Athanasius Kircher the Jesuit, pretended likewise to the Knowledge of this Secret, but does not say that he received it from Van Helmont, but affirms that he discovered or thought he had discovered it from some Passages in the Writings of Hippocrates. It is indeed said by a late ingenious Author, that the enthusiastical Chymist, whose Head swarmed with Reveries and Phantoms imparted this Remedy to Kircher, and that Kircher ''this Way came by his pretended Discovery: This indeed he roundly affirms, and there wants nothing but Proof to make me believe it. Is it credible that this should be true, that Kircher should rely on the Authority of a Vision that appeared to a crack-brained Adept, and that he should never make the least mention of him in this Matter, but affirm that he dug and drew up this Knowledge from the Depths of Hippocrates himself? And had it been otherwise, is it credible that he should submit it to the Perusal of the Society of the Jesuits, and the most eminent Physicians then'' in