Page:Chronicles of pharmacy (Volume 1).djvu/261

 afterwards said to be sulphate of potash. He recommended sublimed sulphur in inflammatory maladies, saffron of Mars in dysentery, and salts of tin against worms.

Whether his formulas were purposely obscure in so many cases, or whether mystery is due to the carelessness or ignorance of the copyists cannot be known. Much of his chemical and pharmaceutical advice is clear enough.

Honey he extols as a liquor rather divine than human, inasmuch as it falls from heaven upon the herbs. To get its quintessence you are to distil from it in a capacious retort a liquid, red like blood. This is distilled over and over again in a bain mariæ until you get a liquid of the colour of gold and of such pleasant odour that the like cannot be found in the world. This quintessence is itself good for many things, but from it the precious potable gold may be made. The juice of a lemon with this quintessence will dissolve leaf gold in warm ashes in forty-eight hours. With this Paracelsus says he has effected many wonderful cures which people thought he accomplished by enchantment. Elsewhere he speaks of an arcanum drawn from vitriol which is so excellent that he prefers it to that drawn from gold.

He refers with great respect to alchemy and the true alchemists, but with considerable shrewdness in regard to their professions of transmuting other metals into gold. He considered it remarkable that a man should be able to convert one substance into another in a few short days or weeks, while Nature requires years to bring about a similar result; but he will not deny the possibility. What he insists on, however, is that from metals and fire most valuable remedies can be obtained; and the apothecary who does not understand the right