Treatise on general and industrial inorganic chemistry / by Etore Molinari ; third revised and amplified Italian edition translated by Ernest Feilman.
- Ettore Molinari
- Date:
- 1912
Licence: In copyright
Credit: Treatise on general and industrial inorganic chemistry / by Etore Molinari ; third revised and amplified Italian edition translated by Ernest Feilman. Source: Wellcome Collection.
36/734
![Ccrtain facts supported these alchemists in their pretcnsions to manufacturc gold from othcr inetals. These consisted in thè fact that during prolonged treatment of certain orcs traces of gold resiilted. It is no longer doubted that this gold is simply present as an impurity in thè oios cmploycd. An alchemist of Hamburg named Brandt searched for thè philoso))her’s stono in urine in IbOl). He heated and slowly evaporated enormous quantities of urine in largo alembics, hoping to finally discover thè famous stono. As it happened, to his oxtreme surprise and thè intense amazement of liis contemporaries, he actually obtained a new substance which ovolvcd light in thè dark, namely, phosphorus. To thè two components of metals, mcrcury and sulphur, Basii Valentine added a third, namely, salt, and from that timo thè study of thè metallic salts commenccd. lATROCHEMISTRY. With Paracelsus, a Swiss (1493-1541), a new phasc of alchemy commcnces, callcd iatrochemistry, that is, thè chemistry of medicines to prolong thè life of mankind. Paracelsus combated thè theories of thè celebrated medicai men Galcn (131 B.c.) and Avicenna, an Arab (800 b.c.). He considered man as a Chemical combina- tion, and stateci that illnesscs occiuTed because this combination was altcred, conscquently illncss conici only be cured by Chemical means. The purpose of chemistry, accorcling to him, was not to search for gold but to prcpare medicines, and this search led him to im- por tant disco veri es. He travelled tlu’oughout Europe, Egypt, and Turkey, was Professor of Medicine at Basic a,ncl dieci at Salzburg in very great poverty. This was thè bitter reward for his honesty, as he always fought against thè quackery and stupidity of thè self-stylcd manufacturers of gold, by whom he was persecuted, directly or indirectly, until his death. The contemporaries and successors of Paracelsus were Agricola in Germany (1490-1553), who carefully stuclied thè smelting of metals, and Libavius, also in Germany (1540-1616), who Avrete thè first text-book of alchemy, in which he collected ah thè Chemical knowledge of thè time ; Van Helmont of Brussels (1577-1644), who was a medicai man of world- wide celebrity, stuclied alchemy in thè sanie sense as Paracelsus, clistinguished for thè first time various kinds of gases, and identified thè gas produeed in fermentation with that from thè Grotto of Dogs (near Naples). He believed vaguely that thè first cause of all things was water and something super- natui’al which was combined with it.i The first to openly attack thè Aristotelian hypothesis on thè constituents of nature, heat, coki, humidity, and dryness, were : thè brilliant but not always sincere English philosopher, Francis Bacon (1562-1626), who revived thè atomic hypothesis of Democritus, maintained that mattcr was indestructible, and who intuitively guessed by means of philosopliical speculatici! thè cxistence of universal gravitation ; he clarihed ideas on thè inductivc inethod applicd to Science, basing naturai laws on known faets and on expericncc, in a nianner first started by Palissy, Leonardo da Vinci, and Paracelsus. He may be considered as thè first founder of thè inductive method {see below). Bacon already defined heat as thè efl’ect of a motion, extension, and unclulation of thè ‘ To forni an idoa of thè extravagant eonceptions lield even by thè latrocheinists wi(h regard to niedieines and thè cause of diseases, it is neeessary to read thè writings of Van Helmont (1620) on “ The Causes and Nature of Tever.” We vili confine ourselves bere to translating thè recipe of his celebiated oiutment which was sui>poseil to cure any fever, especially quartan-fever : “One heats in a brass pan 11 oz. of turpentine of C’yprus and then introdiiees fiftecn live spiders and mixes until tlie spiders bave disappeared ; one then plaees thè wliole on thè lire and eontinues to stir, introducing as niany cobwehs as thè spiders would presuniably bave spini, or, if eobwebs are lacking, one adds nine other sniall spiders and agitates further ; oiic then aihls lA oz. of good as]dialte alidi oz. of whitesal ammoniae, and allows to cool uiitil one obtains a iiaste which is allowed to stand for fiftecn ilays. Mcanwhilc one iirepares a special oil in thè following nianiier ; One mixes oil of fresh water-Iily llowers, one ycar old, with oil of bitter almonds ; nine live scorjiiims are then introduecd and thè whole is exposed to thè siili when this is in thè constcllatioii of thè Virgin or of thè Crab, and it is Icft thus until thè scorpions are dead ; 1 oz. of pastcl of female vipers is then added and it is left in thè siiii for a fnrthcr lifteen days. 'The oil is tluii ready. The paste is then softeiied on thè lire and worked iq) by means of thè haiuls with thè oil already iirepared in sneh a maiiner that a paste is obtained, which is siuead ont on a skin, which is then cut iiito i»ieces as largc as a dollar. And now follows thè method of application ; An honr beforc thè fever appears one ties two of these ointmeiit prcparations to thè wrists of thè jiatient and leaves them for exaetly nine days (nine were thè small spiders ami nino thè scorinons !), takes them oli at thè sanie honr at which they were applicd and throws them into rniming water. Whatiivor be thè nature of thè fever, after this cure it will disappear.” Who wonld suppose that after four centnries, even in Italy amongst thè ignorant mass of thè citics, similar reeiiies are stili largcly used ? Stili more remarkable are thè ideas of Paracelsus. ilis sudorilic with a mcrcury base was celebrated for a long time, and was supiuised to cure an extraordinary nnmber of maladios. In 18t)-l two interesling docnments saw thè light (Cliem. Zeitg., 18, p. 1<)!)8) which showed that alchemy survives even in onr own lime. These are two letters of a modern (ierman alchemist who olfers himself to thè owner of a copper mine to plaia- at his disjiosal bis secret for extraeting £12 worth of gold from cadi 50 kilos of old copper, w lnlever ma'- be its origin, and demanda a fec of 10,000 thaler, about £1600, for revcaling thè said sccrct, which had uoat hiiu thirty years of work.](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b28134187_0038.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
