Page:Hermetic and Alchemical Writings of Paracelsus Vol I (IA cu31924092287121).djvu/177

 into water. And as you have heard concerning Coagulation, so know also concerning Solution, namely, that no corporeal matter can be resolved into water unless it originally was water, and such is the case with all mineral substances.

Tincture is the seventh and last step, which concludes the work of our mystery, with reference to transmutation, makes all imperfect things perfect, transmutes them into their noblest essence and highest state of health, and changes them to another colour. Tincture, therefore, is the noblest matter with which bodies, metallic and human, are tinged, translated into a better and far more noble essence, and into their supreme health and purity. For a Tincture colours all things according to its own nature and its own colour. But there are many and various Tinctures, and not only for metallic and human bodies, since everything which penetrates another matter, or tinges it with another colour or essence, so that it is no longer like what it was before, may be called a Tincture. So then there are manifold tinctures, that is to say, of metals, minerals, human bodies, waters, liquids, oils, salts, all fat substances—in a word, of all things which, with or without fire, can be brought or reduced to a state of fluxion. For if the tincture is to tinge, it is necessary that the body or material which is to be tinged should be open, and in a state of flux; for unless this were so, the tincture could not operate. For it would be just as though one were to cast saffron, or some other colour, into coagulated water or ice; it would not tint the ice so quickly with its colour as if one were to put it into other water. And, although it might tinge the ice, it would at the same time reduce it into water. Wherefore, metals also, which we wish to tinge, must be liquefied by fire, and freed from their coagulation. And here it should be known that the more hotly they are liquefied the more rapidly the tincture runs through them, just as fermentation penetrates the whole mass and imparts acidity to it, and the better it is covered up, and the warmer the mass is kept, the more perfectly it ferments, and the better bread it gives: for fermentation is a Tincture of the farinaceous mass and of the bread.