Page:The Sceptical Chymist.djvu/85

CHYMIST. Ashy Colour as well as Weight were called by the same Greeks σποδὸς, which, I need not tell you, in their Language signifies Ashes. I might add, that I have not found that from Venetian Talck (I say Venetian, because I have found other kinds of that Mineral more open) from the Lapis Ossifragus, (which the Shops call Ostiocolla ) from Muscovia Glass, from pure and Fusible Sand, to mention now no other Concretes; those of my Acquaintance that have try’d have been able by the Fire to separate any one of the Hypostatical Principles, which you will the less scruple to believe, if you consider that Glass may be made by the bare Colliquation of the Salt and Earth remaining in the Ashes of a burnt Plant, and that yet common Glass, once made, does so far resist the violence of the Fire, that most Chymists think it a Body more undestroyable then Gold it self. For if the Artificer can so firmly unite such comparative gross Particles as those of Earth and Salt that make up common Ashes, into a Body indissoluble by Fire; why may not Nature associate in divers Bodies the more minute Elementary Corpuscles she has at hand too firmly to