Certainly here is cause of Admiration, that the Internal Nature of Lead, by the simple maturation of Spirit of Salt, should appear in an external form so noble. No less admirable and wonderful to the mind is this, viz. that the mirifick Stone of Philosophers can so exceeding swiftly transmute Metals; having virtue potentially insited in it self, so as it is deduced into Art, as in Iron by contact of the Magnet. But touching These enough for the Sons of Art.
Since promises are so much the better esteemed, by how much the sooner they are fulfilled, I, without any dilation, immediately come to my promised Declaration of the following History, which thus take.
At the Hague, on the sixth Calend of January or the 27th. of December, in the year 1666, a certain man came to my House in the Afternoon, to me indeed planely unknown, but endued with an honest gravity, and serious authority of Countenance, cloathed in a Plebick Habit, like to some Memnonite of a middle Stature, his Visage somewhat long, with some Pock-holes here and there dispersed: his Hairs were indeed very black, yet not curled, little or no no hair on his Chin, and about three or four and fourty years of Age: his Countrey (as far as I am able to conjecture) is the Septentrional Batavia, vulgarly called Nord Hollund.
After salutations ended, his new Guest, with great Reverence, asked, whether he might have freedom to come to me; because for the Pyrotechnick Art sake, he could not, nor was he willing to pass by the Door of my house; adding, that he had not only thought to have made use of some Friend to come to me, but had also read some of my little Treaties, especially that, which I published against D. Digbies Sympathetick Powder, in which I discovered my doubt of the true Philosophick Mystery. Therefore, this occasion being taken, he asked me, whether I could believe, that place was given to such a Mystery in the things of Nature, by the benefit of which a Physician might be able to cure all Diseases universally, unless the Sick already had a defect either of the Lungs, or Liver, or of any like noble Member? To which I answered. Such a Remedy is exceeding necessary for a Physician, but no man knows, what and how great are the Secrets yet hidden in Nature, nor did I ever, in all my Life see such an Adept Man, although I have read and perused many things, touching the verity of this thing, or Art, in the Writings of Philosophers. I also enquired of him, whether he (speaking of the Universal Medicine) were not a Physician? But he answering by denyal, professed, that he was no other than a Melter of Orichalcum, and that in the Flower of his years, he had known many things, from his Friend, rare to the Sight, and especially the way of Extracting Medicinal Arcanums by the force of Fire, and that for this very cause, he was a Lover of this so noble Science of Medicine. Moreover, long after other discourses, touching Experiments in Metals, made by the violence of Fire, Elias the Artist spake to me thus; Do not you know the Highest Secret, when it is offered to your sight, viz. the Stone of Phylosophers, you having read in the Writings of many Chymists most excellent, touching the Substance, Colour, and strange effect of the same? I answered, not at all; except what I have read in Paracelsus, Helmont, Basilius, Sandivogius, and like Books of Adept Phylosophers extant. Nevertheless, I think, I am not able to know the Phylosophick Matter, whether it be true, or not, although I should see it present before me.