CHAP. I.

SInce a great part of those Lear­ned Men, especially Physicians, who have discerned the defects of the vulgar Philosophy, but are not yet come to understand and re­lish the Corpuscularian, have slid into the Doctrine of the Chymists; and since the Spagyrists are wont to pre­tend to make out all the Qualities of bodies from the Predominancy of some one of their three Hypostatical [Page 4] Principles, I suppose it may both keep my opinion from appearing too pre­sumptuous, and (which is far more considerable) may make way for the fairer Reception of the Mechanical Hypothesis about Qualities, if I here intimate (though but briefly and in general) some of those defects, that I have observed in Chymists Explica­tions of Qualities.

And I might begin with taking no­tice of the Obscurity of those Prin­ciples, which is no small defect in Notions whose proper office it should be to conduce to the illustration of others. For, how can that facilitate the understanding of an obscure Quality or Phaenomenon which is it self scarcely intelligible, or at least needs almost as much explanation as the thing 'tis designed & pretended to explicate? Now a man need not be very conversant in the writings of Chymists to observe, in how Laxe, Indefinite, and almost Arbitrary Sen­ses they employ the Terms of Salt, Sulphur and Mercury; of which I [Page 5] could never find that they were a­greed upon any certain Definitions or setled Notions; not onely diffe­ring Authors, but not unfrequently one and the same, and perhaps in the same Brook, employing them in ve­ry differing senses. But I will not give the Chymists any rise to pretend, that the chief fault that I find with their Hypothesis is but verbal; though that it self may not a little blemish any Hypothesis, one of the first of whose Requisites ought to be Clear­ness; and therefore I shall now ad­vance and take notice of defects that are manifestly of another kind.

And first the Doctrine that all their Theory is grounded on, seems to me Inevident and undemonstrated, not to say precarious. It is somewhat strange to me, that neither the Spa­gyrists themselves, nor yet their Ad­versaries, should have taken notice, that Chymists have rather supposed than evinced, that the Analysis of bo­dies by fire, or even that at least some Analysis is the onely instrument of in­vestigating [Page 6] what Ingredients mixt bo­dies are made up of, since in divers cases That may be discovered by Composition as well as by Resoluti­on; as it may appear, that Vitriol con­sists of metalline parts (whether Mar­tial, or Venereal, or both) associa­ted by Coagulation with acid ones, one may, I say, discover this as well by making true Vitriol with Spirit (improperly called Oil) of Sulphur, or that of Salt, as by distilling or Re­solving Vitriol by the fire.

But I will not here enlarge on this subject, nor yet will I trouble you with what I have largely discoursed in the Sceptical Chymist, to call in que­stion the grounds on which Chymists assert, that all mixt bodies are com­pounded of Salt, Sulphur, and Mer­cury. For it may suffice me now to tell you, that, whatsoever they may be able to obtain from other bodies, it does not appear by Experience, which is the grand, if not the onely, Argument they rely on, that all mixt bodies that have Qualities, consist of [Page 7] their tria prima, since they have not been able, that we know, truly, and without new Compositions, to re­solve into those three, either Gold, or Silver, or Crystal, or Venetian Talck, or some other bodies, that I elsewhere name; & yet these bodies are en­dowed with divers Qualities, as the two former with Fusibleness and Malleability, and all of them with Weight and Fixity; so that in these and the like bodies, whence Chymists have not made it yet appear, that their Salt, Sulphur and Mercury, can be truly and adequately separated, 'twill scarce be other than precarious, to derive the malleableness, colour, and other Qualities of such bodies from those Principles.

Under this Head I consider also, that a great part of the Chymical Doctrine of Qualities is bottom'd on, or supposes, besides their newly que­stioned Analysis by fire, some other things, which, as far as I know, have not yet been well proved, and I que­stion whether they ever will be.

[Page 8] One of their main Suppositions is, that this or that Quality must have its [...], as Sennertus, the Learnedst Champion of this opinion, calls it, or some particular material Principle, to the participation of which, as of the primary native and genuine subject, all other bodies must owe it: But upon this point having purposely discoursed elsewhere, I shall now onely observe, that, not to mention Local motion and Figure, I think 'twill be hard to shew, what is the [...] of Gravity, Vola­tility, Heat, Sonorousness, Transpa­rency and Opacity, which are Qua­lities to be indifferently met with in bodies whether simple or mixt.

And whereas the Spagyrists are wont to argue, that, because this or that Quality is not to be derived truly from this or that particular Principle, as Salt, for instance, and Mercury; therefore it must needs be derivable from the third, as Sulphur. This way of arguing involves a farther Sup­position than that newly examined. [Page 9] For it implies, that every Quality in a compounded body must arise from some one of the tria prima, whereas experience assures us, that bodies may, by Composition, obtain Quali­ties, that were not to be found in any of the separate Ingredients. As we see in painting, that though blew and yellow be neither of them green, yet their mixture will be so. And though no single Sound will make an octave or diapason; yet two sounds, whose proportion is double, will have an eighth. And Tinn and Copper mel­ted and mingled together in a due proportion, will make a bell-metal far more sonorous than either of them was before. 'Tis obvious enough for Chymists themselves to observe, that, though Lead be an insipid body, and Spirit of Vinegar a very sharp one, yet Saccharum Saturni, that is compounded out of these two, has a sweetness that makes it not ill de­serve its name.

But this ill-grounded Supposition of the Chymists, is extended farther [Page 10] in an usual Topic of theirs, according to which they conclude, That I know not how many Qualities, as well ma­nifest as occult, must be explicated by their tria prima, because they are not explicable by the four elements of the Peripateticks. To make which argumentation valid, it must be pro­ved, (which I fear it will never be) that there are no other wayes, by which those Qualities may be expli­cated, but by a determinate number of Material Principles, whether four or three: Besides that, till they have shewn that such Qualities may be in­telligibly explicated by their Prin­ciples, the objection will lye as strong for the Aristotelians against them, as for them against the Aristotelians.

CHAP. II.

NExt I consider, that there are divers Qualities even in mixt bodies, wherein it does not appear, that the use of the Chymical Doctrine [Page 11] is Necessary. As, for instance, when pure Gold is by Heat onely brought to fusion, and consequently to the state of fluidity, and upon the remis­sion of that heat, grows a solid and consistent body again, what addition or expulsion or change of any of the tria prima does appear to be the cause of this change of consistence? Which is easie to be accounted for according to the Mechanical way, by the vehe­ment agitation that the fire makes of the minute parts of the Gold to bring it to fusion; and the cohesion of those parts, by vertue of their gravity and fitness to adhere to one another, when that agitation ceases. When Venice Glass is meerly by being bea­ten to pouder deprived of its Trans­parency and turned into a body opa­cous and white, what need or use of the tria prima have we in the expli­cation of this Phaenomenon? Or of that other which occurs, when by barely melting down this white and opacous body it is deprived of its opacity and colour, and becomes [Page 12] diaphanous? And of this sort of In­stances you will meet with divers in the following Notes about particular Qualities; for which reason I shall forbear the mention of them here.

CHAP. III.

I Observe too, that the Spagyrical Doctrine of Qualities is Insuffici­ent and too narrow to reach to all the Phaenomena or even to all the notable ones, that ought to be ex­plicable by them. And this Insuffici­ency I find to be two-fold; for, first, there are divers Qualities, of which Chymists will not so much as attempt to give us explications, and of other particular Qualities the explications, such as they are that they give us, are often very deficient and unsatis­factory; and do not sometimes so much as take notice of divers consi­derable Phaenomena that belong to the Qualities whereof they pretend to give an account; of which you [Page 13] will meet with divers Instances in the insuing Notes. And therefore I shall onely, (to declare my meaning the better,) invite you to observe with me, that though Gold be the body they affect to be most conversant with; yet it will be very hard to shew, how the specific weight of Gold can be deduced from any or all of the three Principles, since Mercury it self, that is of bodies, known to us, the heaviest next to Gold, is so much lighter than Gold, that, whereas I have usually found Mercury to be to an equal weight of water, somewhat, though little, less than fourteen to one, I find pure Gold to be about nineteen times as heavy as so much water. Which will make it very dif­ficult, not to say impossible for them to explain, how Gold should barely by participating of Mercury, which is a body much lighter than it self, ob­tain that great specific gravity we find it to have; for the two other Hypostatical Principles, we know, are far lighter than Mercury. And I [Page 14] think it would much puzzle the Chy­mists, to give us any examples of a compounded body, that is specifical­ly heavier than the heaviest of the Ingredients that it is made up of. And this is the first kind of Insufficiency I was taking notice of in the Chymical Doctrine of Qualities.

The other is, That there are seve­ral bodies which the most Learned among themselves confess not to con­sist of their tria prima, and yet are in­dowed with Qualities, which conse­quently are not in those subjects to be explicated by the tria prima which are granted not to be found in them. Thus elementary Water, though never so pure, (as distilled Rain-water,) has fluidity and coldness and humidi­ty and transparency and volatility, without having any of the tria prima. And the purest Earth, as Ashes care­fully freed from the fixt salt, has gra­vity and consistence and dryness and colour and fixity, without owing them either to Salt, Sulphur, or Mer­cury; not to mention, that there are [Page 15] Celestial bodies which do not ap­pear, nor are wont to be pretended, to consist of the tria prima, that yet are indowed with Qualities. As the Sun has Light, and as many Philoso­phers think, Heat, and Colour; and the Moon has a determinate consi­stence and figuration, (as appears by her mountains) and Astronomers ob­serve, that the higher Planets and e­ven the Fixt stars appear to be dif­feringly coloured. But I shall not multiply Instances of this kind, be­cause what I have said, may not one­ly serve for my present purpose, but bring a great Confirmation to what I lately said, when I noted, that the Chymical Principles were in many cases not necessary to explicate Qua­lities: For since in Earth, Water, &c. such diffused Qualities, as gravity, sixtness, colour, transparency and fluidity, must be acknowledged not to be derived from the tria prima; 'tis plain, that portions of matter may be endowed with such Qualities by other causes and agents than Salt, [Page 16] Sulphur and Mercury. And then why should we deny, that also in compounded bodies those Qualities may be (sometimes at least) produ­ced by the same or the like Causes? As we see, that the reduction of a diaphanous Solid to pouder, produ­ces whiteness, whether the commi­nution happens to Rock-crystal or to Venice-glass, or to Ice: The first of which is acknowledged to be a natural and perfectly mixt body; the second a factitious and not onely mixt but decompounded body; and the last, for ought appears, an ele­mentary body, or at most very slight­ly and imperfectly mixt. And so by mingling Air in small portions with a diaphanous Liquor, as we do when we beat such a Liquor into foam, a whiteness is produced, as well in pure Water, which is acknowledged to be a simple body, as in white Wine, which is reckoned among perfectly mixt bodies.

CHAP. IV.

I Further observe, that the Chymists Explications do not reach deep and far enough. For first, most of them are not sufficiently distinct and full, so as to come home to the parti­cular Phaenomena, nor often times so much as to all the grand ones, that belong to the History of the Quali­ties they pretend to explicate. You will readily believe, that a Chymist will not easily make out by his Salt, Sulphur, and Mercury, why a Load-stone capp'd with steel may be made to take up a great deal more Iron, sometimes more than eight or ten times as much, than if it be immediat­ly applied to the iron; or why, if one end of the Magnetic Needle is di­spos'd to be attracted by the North-pole, for instance, of the Load-stone, the other Pole of the Load-stone will not attract it but drive it away: or, why a bar or rod of iron, being heated red-hot and cooled perpendi­cularly, [Page 18] will with its lower end drive away the flower de Luce, or the North-end of a Marriners Needle, which the upper end of the same barr or rod will not repell but draw to it. In short, of above threescore Pro­perties or notable Phaenomena of Magnetic Bodies, that some Writers have reckon'd up, I do not remember that any three have been by Chymists so much as attempted to be solved by their three Principles. And even in those Qualities, in whose explicati­ons these Principles may more pro­bably than elsewhere pretend to have a place, the Spagyrists accounts are wont to fall so short of being distinct and particular enough, that they use to leave divers considerable Phaeno­mena untouch'd, and do but very lamely or slightly explicate the more obvious or familiar. And I have so good an opinion of divers of the em­bracers of the Spagyrical Theory of Qualities (among whom I have met with very Learned and worthy men) that I think, that if a Quality being [Page 19] pos'd to them, they were at the same time presented with a good Cata­logue of the Phaenomena, that they may take, in the History of it, as it were with one view, they would plainly perceive that there are more particulars to be accounted for, than at first they were aware of; and di­vers of them such, as may quite dis­courage considering men from taking upon them to explain them all by the Tria prima, and oblige them to have recourse to more Catholic and com­prehensive Principles. I know not, whether I may not add on this occasi­on, that, methinks, a Chymist, who by the help of his Tria Prima, takes upon him to interpret that Book of Nature of which the Qualities of bo­dies make a great part, acts at but a little better rate than he, that seeing a great book written in a Cypher, whereof he were acquainted but with three Letters, should undertake to decypher the whole piece. For though 'tis like, he would in many words find one of the Letters of his [Page 20] short key, and in divers words two of them, and perhaps in some all three; yet, besides that in most of the words wherein the known Let­ter or Letters may be met with, they may be so blended with other un­known Letters as to keep him from decyphering a good part of those ve­ry words, 'tis more than probable, that a great part of the book would consist of words wherein none of his three Letters were to be found.

CHAP. V.

AND this is the first account, on which I observe that the Chy­mical Theory of Qualities does not reach far enough: But there is ano­ther branch of its deficiency. For even, when the explications seem to come home to the Phaenomena, they are not primary, and, if I may so speak, Fontal enough. To make this [Page 21] appear, I shall at present imploy but these two Considerations. The first is, that those substances themselves, that Chymists call their Principles, are each of them indowed with seve­ral Qualities. Thus Salt is a consi­stent, not a fluid, body; it has its weight, 'tis dissoluble in water, is ei­ther diaphanous or opacous, fixt or volatile, sapid or insipid; (I speak thus disjunctively, because Chymists are not all agreed about these things; and it concerns not my Argument, which of the disputable Qualities be resolved upon.) And Sulphur, ac­cording to them, is a body fusible, in­flammable, &c. and, according to Ex­perience, is consistent, heavy, &c. So that 'tis by the help of more primary and general Principles, that we must explicate some of those Qualities, which being found in bodies, suppo­sed to be perfectly similar or homo­geneous, cannot be pretended to be derived in one of them from the o­ther. And to say, that 'tis the nature of a Principle to have this or that [Page 22] Quality, as, for instance, of Sulphur to be fusible, and therefore we are not to exact a Reason why it is so; though I could say much by way of answer, I shall now only observe, that this Argument is grounded but upon a supposition, and will be of no force, if from the primary affections of bo­dies one may deduce any good Me­chanical Explication of Fusibility in the general, without necessarily sup­posing such a Primigeneal Sulphur, as the Chymists fancy, or deriving it from thence in other bodies. And indeed, since not only Salt-peter, Sea salt, Vitriol and Allum, but Salt of Tartar, and the Volatile Salt of Urine are all of them fusible; I do not well see, how Chymists can derive the fu­sibleness even of Salts obtained by their own analysis (such as Salt of Tartar and of Urine) from the par­ticipation of the Sulphureous Ingredi­ent; especially since, if such an at­tempt should be made, it would over­throw the Hypothesis of three Simple bodies, whereof they will have all [Page 23] mixt ones to be compounded; and still 'twould remain to be explicated, upon what account the Principle, that is said to endow the other with such a Quality, comes to be endowed therewith it self. For 'tis plain, that a mass of Sulphur is not an Atomical or Adamantine body; but consists of a multitude of Corpuscles of deter­minate Figures, and connected after a determinate manner: so that it may be reasonably demanded, why such a Convention of particles, rather than many another that does not, consti­tutes a fusible body.

CHAP. VI.

AND this leads me to a further Consideration, which makes me look upon the Chymists explications as not deep and radical enough; and it is this, that, when they tell us, for instance, that the fusibleness of bo­dies proceeds from Sulphur, in case they say true, they do but tell us what material Ingredient 'tis that be­ing mingled with and dispers'd through the other parts of a body, makes it apt to melt: But this does not intelligibly declare, what it is that makes a portion of matter fu­sible, and how the sulphureous Ingre­dient introduces that disposition into the rest of the mass, wherewith 'tis commixt or united. And yet 'tis such explications as these, that an inquisi­tive Naturalist chiefly looks after, and which I therefore call Philosophical. And to shew, that there may be more Fontal explications, I shall only [Page 25] observe, that, not to wander from our present instance, Sulphur it self is fusible. And therefore, as I lately intimated, Fusibility, which is not the Quality of one Atome, or Par­ticle, but of an Aggregate of Parti­cles, ought it self to be accounted for in that Principle, before the Fu­sibleness of all other bodies be deri­ved from it. And 'twill in the fol­lowing notes appear, that in Sulphur it self that Quality may be probably deduced from the convention of Cor­puscles of determinate shapes and sizes, contexed or connected after a convenient manner. And if either nature, or art, or chance, should bring together particles endowed with the like Mechanical Affections, and associate them after the like manner, the resulting body would be fusible, though the component particles had never been parts of the Chymists pri­mordial sulphur: And such particles so convening might perhaps have made Sulphur it self, though before there had been no such body in the [Page 26] world. And what I say to those Chymists, that make the sulphureous Ingredient the cause of fusibility, may easily, mutatis mutandis, be applied to their Hypothesis, that rather as­cribe that quality to the Mercurial or the Saline Principle, and consequent­ly cannot give a rational account of the fusibility of Sulphur. And there­fore though I readily allow (as I shall have afterwards occasion to declare) that Sulphur, or an other of the tria prima, may be met with, and even a­bound in several bodies endowed with the quality that is attributed to their participation of that Principle; yet that this may be no certain sign that the propos'd Quality must flow from that Ingredient, you may per­haps be assisted to discern by this il­lustration, That if Tin be duly mixt with Copper or Gold, or, as I have tried, with Silver or Iron, it will make them very brittle; and it is also an Ingredient of divers other bodies that are likewise brittle, as blew, green, white, and otherwise colour'd, Amels, [Page 27] which are usually made of calcin'd Tin (which the Tradesmen call Put­tee,) colliquated with the Ingredients of Crystal-glass and some small por­tion of Mineral pigment. But though in all the above-named brittle bodies, Tin be a considerable Ingredient; yet 'twere very unadvised to affirm, that Brittleness in general proceeds from Tin. For provided the solid parts of consistent bodies touch one another but according to small portions of their surfaces, and be not implicated by their contexture, the Metalline or other Composition may be brittle, though there be no Tin at all in it. And in effect, the materials of glass being brought to fusion will compose a brittle body, as well when there is no Puttee colliquated with them, as when there is. Calcin'd Lead by the action of the fire may be melted into a brittle mass, and even into transpa­rent Glass, without the help of Tin or any other additament. And I need not add, that there are a multitude of other bodies, that cannot be pretend­ed [Page 28] to owe their brittleness to any par­ticipation of Tin, of which they have no need, if the matter they consist of wants not the requisite Mechanical Dispositions.

And here I shall venture to add, that the way employed by the Chymists, as well as the Peripateticks, of ac­counting for things by the Ingredi­ents, whether Elements, Principles, or other bodies, that they suppose them to consist of, will often frustrate the Naturalists expectation of events, which may frequently prove differ­ing from what he promis'd himself, up­on the Consideration of the Qualities of each Ingredient. For the ensuing Notes contain divers Instances, wherein there emerges a new Quality differing from, or even contrary to, any that is conspicuous in the Ingre­dients; as two transparent bodies may make an opacous mixture, a yel­low body and a blew, one that is green, two malleable bodies, a brittle one, two actually cold bodies, a hot [Page 29] one, two fluid bodies, a consistent one, &c. And as this way of judg­ing by material Principles hinders the foreknowledg of Events from being certain; so it much more hinders the assignation of Causes from being sa­tisfactory; so that perhaps some would not think it very rash to say, that those who judg of all mixt bodies as Apo­thecaries do of Medicines, barely by the Qualities and Proportions of the Ingredients (such as among the Ari­stotelians are the four Elements, and among the Chymists the tria prima,) do, as if one should pretend to give an account of the Phaenomena and operations of Clocks and Watches, and their Diversities by this, That some are made of brass wheels, some of iron, some have plain ungilt wheels, others of wheels overlaid with Gold, some furnished with gut­strings, others with little chains, &c. and that therefore the Qualities and Predominancies of these metalls that make parts of the Watch, ought to have ascribed to them, what indeed [Page 30] flows from their Coordination and Contrivance.

CHAP. VII.

THE last defect I observe in the Chymical Doctrine of Quali­ties, is, that in many cases it agrees not well with the Phaenomena of Nature, and that by one or both of these ways. First, there are divers changes of Qualities, wherein one may well ex­pect, that a Chymical Principle should have a great stroak, and yet it does not at all appear to have so. He that considers, what great operations di­vers of the Hermeticks ascribe to this or that Hypostatical Principle, and how many Qualities according to them must from it be derived, can scarce do other than expect, that a great change as to those Qualities happening in a mixt body, should at least be accompany'd with some no­table action of, or alteration in the [Page 31] Principle. And yet I have met with many instances, wherein Qualities are produced, or abolished, or very much altered, without any manifest intro­duction, expulsion, or considerable change of the Principle, whereon that Quality is said to depend, or per­haps of either of the two others: As when a piece of fine silver, that having been neald in the fire, and suf­fer'd to cool leisurely, is very flexible, is made stiff and hard to bend, barely by a few stroaks of a hammer. And a string of a Lute acquires or loses a sympathy, as they call it, with another string of the same or another Instru­ment, barely by being either stretch­ed so as to make an Unison with it, or screw'd up or let down beyond or beneath that degree of Ten­sion.

To multiply instances of this kind would be to anticipate those, you will hereafter meet with in their due pla­ces. And therefore I shall pass on from the first sort of Phaenomena, that favour not the Chymical Hypothesis [Page 32] about Qualities, to the other which consists of those, wherein either that does not happen which according to their Hypothesis ought to happen, or the contrary happens to what accord­ing to their Hypothesis may justly be expected. Of this you will meet with instances hereafter; I shall now trou­ble you but with one, the better to declare my meaning. 'Tis not un­known to those Chymists, that work much in Silver and in Copper, that the former will endure Ignition and become red-hot in the fire, before it will be brought to fusion; and the latter is yet far more difficult to be melted down than the other; yet if you separately dissolve those two metalls in Aqua fortis, and by evapo­ration reduce them to Crystalls, these will be brought to fusion in a very little time, and with a very mo­derate Heat, without breaking the glasses that contain them. If you ask a vulgar Chymist the cause of this facility of fusion, he will proba­bly tell you without scruple, that 'tis [Page 33] from the saline parts of the Aqua for­tis, which, being imbodied in the metals and of a very fusible nature, impart that easiness of fusion to the metals they are mixt with. Accor­ding to which plausible explication one might well expect, that, if the saline Corpuscles were exquisitly mingled with Tin, they would make it far more fusible than of it self it is. And yet, as I have elsewhere noted, when I put Tin into a convenient quantity of Aqua fortis, the metal be­ing corroded, subsided, as is usual, in the form of whites of eggs, which be­ing well dried, the Tinn was so far from being grown more fusible by the addition of the saline particles of the Menstruum, that, whereas 'tis known that simple Tin will melt long before it come to be red-hot, this prepar'd Tin would endure for a good while not only a thorow ignition, but the blast of a pair of double bellows, (which we usually imploy'd to melt Silver and Copper it self,) without being at all brought to fusion. And [Page 34] as for those Spagyrists that admit, as most of them are granted to do, that all kinds of metals may be turned into Gold by a very small proportion of what they call the Philosophers Elixir, one may I think shew them from their own concessions, that di­vers Qualities may be changed even in such constant bodies as Metals, without the addition of any consider­able proportion of the simple Ingre­dients, to which they are wont to as­cribe those Qualities; provided the Agent, (as an efficient rather than as a material Cause,) be able to make a great change in the Mechanical af­fections of the parts whereof the metal it acts on is made up. Thus if we suppose a pound of Silver, a pound of Lead, and a pound of Iron to be transmuted into Gold, each by a grain of the powder of projection, this tinging powder, as a material Cause is inconsiderable, by reason of the smaliness of its bulk, and as an effici­ent cause it works differing and even contrary effects, according to the dis­position, [Page 35] wherein it finds the metal to be transmuted, and the changes it pro­duces in the constituent Texture of it. Thus it brings Quick-silver to be fixt, which it was not before, and deprives it of the Fluidity which it had before; it brings Silver to be indissolvable in Aqua fortis, which readily dissolved it before, and dissoluble in Aqua Re­gis, which before would not touch it; and which is very considerable to our present purpose, whereas it makes Iron much more susible than Mars, it makes Lead much less fusible than whilest it retained its pristine form, since Saturn melts ere it come to ig­nition, which Gold requires to bring it to fusion. But this is proposed only as an Argument ad hominem, till the Truth of the transmutation of metals into Gold, by way of projecti­on, be sufficiently proved, and the circumstances and phaenomena of it particularly declared.

I must not forget to take notice, that some learned modern Chymists would be thought to explicate divers [Page 36] of the Changes that happen to Bodies in point of Odours, Colours, &c. by saying that in such alterations the Sul­phur or other Hypostatical Principle is intraverted or extraverted, or, as o­thers speak, inverted. But I confess, to me these seem to be rather new terms then real explications. For, to omit divers of the Arguments men­tioned in this present Treatise, that may be applied to this way of solving the Phaenomena of Qualities, one may justly object, that the supposed Ex­traversion or Intraversion of Sulphur can by no means reach to give an ac­count of so great a variety of Odours, Colours, and other Qualities as may be found in the changed portions of matter we are speaking of. And which is more, what they call by these and the like names, cannot be done without Local motion transposing the particles of the matter, and conse­quently producing in it a change of Texture, which is the very thing we would infer, and which being suppo­sed, we may grant Sulphur to be often­times [Page 37] actually present in the altered Bodies, without allowing it to be al­ways necessary to produce the al­terations in them, since Corpuscles so condition'd and contex'd would per­form such Effects, whether Sulphur, as such, did, or did not, make up the subject-matter of the Change.

And now I shall conclude, and part­ly recapitulate what has been deli­vered in this and the two foregoing Chapters, with this summary consi­deration, That the Chymist's Salt, Sulphur and Mercury themselves are not the first and most simple Princi­ples of Bodies, but rather primary Concretions of Corpuscles or Parti­cles more simple than they, as being endowed only with the first, or most radical (if I may so speak) and most Catholick Affections of simple Bo­dies, namely Bulk, Shape, and Mo­tion, or Rest; by the different Con­ventions or Coalitions of which mi­nutest portions of matter are made those differing Concretions that Chymists name Salt, Sulphur and [Page 38] Mercury. And to this Doctrine it will be consonant, that several Ef­fects of this or that Spagyrical Prin­ciple need not be derived from Salt, for instance, or Sulphur as such, but may be explained by the help of some of those Corpuscles that I have lately call'd more Simple and Radical; and such Explications being more simple and Mechanical, may be thought upon that score more fundamental and sa­tisfactory.

CHAP. VIII.

I Know it may be objected in fa­vour of the Chymists, that as their Hypostatical Principles, Salt, Sulphur and Mercury, are but three, so the Corpuscularian Principles are but very few; and the chief of them Bulk, Size, and Motion, are but three neither; so that it appears not why the Chymical Principles should be [Page 39] more barren than the Mechanical. To which allegation I answer, that, be­sides that these last nam'd Principles are more numerous, as taking in the Posture, Order, and Scituation, the Rest, and, above all, the almost infi­nitely diversifiable Contextures of the small parts, and the thence re­sulting structures of particular bodies, and fabrick of the world: Besides this, I say, each of the three Me­chanical Principles, specified in the objection, though but one in name, is equivalent to many in effect; as Figure, for instance, comprehends not only Triangles, Squares, Rhom­busses, Rhomboids, Trapezions, and a multitude of Polygons, whether ordinate or irregular; but, besides Cubes, Prismes, Cones, Spheres, Cy­linders, Pyramids, and other Solids of known Denominations, a scarce numerable multitude of hooked, branched, Eel-like, screw-like, and other irregular bodies; whereof though these, and some others, have distinct appellations, yet the greatest [Page 40] part are nameless; so that it need be no wonder, that I should make the Mechanical Principles so much more fertile, that is, applicable to the production and explication of a far greater number of Phaenomena, than the Chymical; which, whilest they are considered but as similar bodies, that are Ingredients of mixt and com­pounded ones, are chiefly variable but by the greater or lesser quanti­ty that is employed by Nature or Art to make up the mixt body. And Painters observe, that Black and White, though mixt in differing Pro­portions, will still make but lighter and darker grays. And if it be said, that these Ingredients, by the Tex­ture resulting from their mixtures, may acquire Qualities that neither of them had before; I shall answer, that, to alledge this, is in effect to confess, that they must take in the Mechanical Principles, (for to them belongs the Texture or Structure of bodies) to as­sist the Chymical ones. And on this occasion, to borrow an illustration [Page 41] from our unpublished Dialogue of the Requisites of a good Hypothesis, I shall add, that a Chymist that should pre­tend, that because his three Principles are as many as those of the Corpus­cularians, they are as sufficient as these to give an account of the Book of Nature, methinks, I say, he would do like a man that should pretend, that with four and twenty words he would make up a language as well as others can with the four and twenty Letters of the Alphabet, because he had as many words already formed, as they had of bare Letters; not con­sidering that instead of the small number of variations that can be made of his words by Prepositions and Terminations, the Letters of the Alphabet being variously combined, placed and reiterated, can be easily made to compose not only his four and twenty words, with their variati­ons, but as many others as a whole language contains.

CHAP. IX.

NOtwithstanding all that I have been obliged to say to the Dis­advantage of the Chymical Princi­ples, in reference to the Explication of Qualities, I would not be thought to grant, that the Peripateticks have reason to triumph, as if their four Ele­ments afforded a better Theory of Qualities. For, if I had, together with leisure enough to perform such a Task, any obligation to undertake it, I presume, it would not be difficult to shew, that the Aristotelian Doctrine about particular Qualities is liable to some of the same Objections with the Chymical, and to some others no less considerable; and that, to derive all the Phaenomena their Doctrine ought to solve from Substantial Forms and real Qualities Elementary, is to impose on us a Theory more barren and pre­carious than that of the Spagy­rists.

[Page 43] That to derive the particular Qua­lities of bodies from those Substantial Forms, whence the Schools would have them to flow, is but an insuffici­ent and unfit way of accounting for them, may appear by this, that Substan­tial Forms themselves are things, whose existence many Learned Phi­losophers deny, whose Theory many of them think Incomprehensible, and the most Candid and Judicious of the Peripateticks themselves confess it to be very abstruse; so that from such doubtful and obscure Principles we can hardly expect clear Explications of the nature and Phaenomena of Qua­lities; not to urge, that the Aristoteli­an Definitions, both of Qualities in general, and of divers of the more fa­miliar Qualities in particular, as Heat, Cold, Moisture, Diaphaneity, &c. are far enough from being clear and well framed, as we elsewhere have occasi­on to shew.

Another thing, which makes the Scholastic Doctrine of Qualities un­satisfactory, is, that it seldom so much [Page 44] as attempts to teach the Manner how the Qualities themselves and their Effects or Operations are produced. Of this you may elsewhere find an Instance given in the Quality that is wont to be first in the list, viz that of Heat, which though it may intelligi­bly and probably be explicated by the Corpuscular Hypothesis, yet in the Peripatetic account that is given of it, is both too questionable and too su­perficial to give much Content to a Rational Inquirer. And indeed to say, that a Substantial Form (as that of the Fire) acts by a Quality (call'd Heat) whose Nature 'tis to produce such an effect (as to soften Wax or harden Clay) seems to be no other in sub­stance, than to say, that it produces such an effect by some power it has to produce it. But what that power is, and how it operates, is that, which, though we most desire to know, we are left to seek. But to prosecute the Imperfections of the Peripatetick Hy­pothesis, were to intrench upon ano­ther discourse, where they are more [Page 45] fully laid open. And therefore I shall now but lightly glance upon a couple of imperfections, that more particularly relate to the Doctrine of Qualities.

And first I do not think it a Con­vincing Argument that is wont to be imployed by the Aristotelians for their Elements, as well as by the Chymists for their Principles, that, be­cause this or that Quality, which they ascribe to an Element or a Principle, is found in this or that body, which they call mixt, therefore it must owe that Quality to the participation of that Principle or Element. For, the same Texture of parts or other mo­dification of matter may produce the like Quality in the more simple and the more compounded body, and they may both separately derive it from the same Cause, and not one from the Participation of the other. So Water and Earth and Metals and Stones, &c. are heavy upon the ac­count of the common Cause of Gra­vity, and not because the rest partake [Page 46] of the Earth; as may appear in Ele­mentary water, which is as simple a body as it, and yet is heavy: So wa­ter and oil, and exactly deflegm'd Spi­rit of Wine, and Mercury, and also Metals and Glass of Antimony, and Minium or calcin'd Lead, whilest these three are in fusion are fluid, being made so by the variously determined motions of their minute parts and o­ther Causes of Fluidity, and not by the participation of water, since the arid Calces of Lead and Antimony are not like to have retained in the fire so volatile a liquor as water, and since Fluidity is a Quality that Mer­cury enjoys in a more durable man­ner than Water it self: For that me­talline liquor, as also Spirit of Wine well Rectified, will not be brought to freeze with the highest degree of Cold of our sharpest winters, though a far less degree of Cold would make water cease to be fluid and turn it into Ice.

To this I shall only add (in the se­cond place,) that 'tis not unpleasant [Page 47] to see, how arbitrarily the Peripate­ticks derive the Qualities of bodies from their four Elements, as if, to give an instance in the lately named Qua­lity, Liquidity, you shew them exact­ly deflegmed Spirit of Wine, and ask them, whence it has its great Fluid­ness, they will tell you from water, which yet is far less fluid than it, and this spirit of wine it self is much less so than the flame into which the spi­rit of wine is easily resoluble. But if you ask, whence it becomes totally inflammable, they must tell you, from the fire; and yet the whole body, at least as far as sense can discover, is fluid, and the whole body becomes flame, (and then is most fluid of all;) so that fire and water as contrary as they make them, must both be by vast odds predominant in the same body. This spirit of wine also, being a li­quor whose least parts that are sen­sible are actually heavy, and compose a Liquor which is seven or eight hun­dred times as heavy as Air of the same bulk, which yet experience [Page 48] shews not to be devoid of weight, must be supposed to abound with Earthy particles, and yet this spiri­tuous liquor may in a trice become Flame, which they would have to be the lightest body in the world.

But, to enlarge on this subject, would be to forget, that the design of this Tract engages me to deal not with the Peripatetic School, but the Spagyrical. To which I shall there­fore return, and give you this ad­vertisement about it, that what I have hitherto objected is meant a­gainst the more common and receiv­ed Doctrine about the Material Prin­ciples of bodies reputed mixt, as 'tis wont by vulgar Chymists to be ap­plied to the rendring an account of the Qualities of substances Corpo­real; and therefore I pretend not, that the past objections should con­clude against other Chymical Theo­ries than that which I was concern­ed to question. And if adept Philo­sophers, (supposing there be such) or [Page 49] any other more than ordinarily Intel­ligent Spagyrists, shall propose any particular Hypotheses, differing from those that I have questioned, as their Doctrine and Reasons are not yet known to me; so I pretend not that the past Arguments should conclude against them, and am willing to think, that Persons advantaged with such peculiar opportunities to dive into the Mysteries of Nature, will be able to give us, if they shall please, a far better account of the Qualities of bodies than what is wont to be pro­posed by the generality of Chy­mists.

Thus, dear Pyrophilus, I have laid before you some of the chief Imper­fections I have observed in the vul­gar Chymists Doctrine of Qualities, and consequently I have given you some of the chief Reasons that hin­der me from acquiescing in it. And as my objections are not taken from the Scholastical subtleties nor the doubtful speculations of the Peripa­teticks or other Adversaries of the [Page 50] Hermetick Philosophy, but from the nature of things and from Chymical experiments themselves; so I hope, if any of your Spagyrical friends have a minde to convince me, he will at­tempt to doe it by the most proper way, which is, by actually giving us clear and particular explications, at least of the grand Phaenomena of Qua­lities; which, if he shall do, he will find me very ready to acquiesce in a Truth that comes usher'd in, and endear'd by so acceptable and useful a thing, as a Philosophical Theory of Qualities.

CHAP. I.

I Presume, it will not be difficult to discern, that much of what has been said about the Imperfection of the vulgar Chymical Doctrine con­cerning Qualities, may with easie va­riations be applied to some other Hy­potheses that are of kin to that Do­ctrine, and particularly to their [Page 4] Theory, that would derive both the Qualities of Bodies and the rest of the Phaenomena of Nature from what they call Acidum and Alcali. For though these two differences may be met with in a great number and variety of bodies, and consequently the Consideration of them may frequent­ly enough be of good use, (especial­ly to Spagyrists, and Physitians, when they are conversant about the secon­dary and (if I may so call them) Chy­mical Causes and Operations of di­vers mixt bodies;) yet I confess I can­not acquiesce in this Hypothesis of Al­kali and Acidum, in the latitude, wherein I find it urged and applied by the Admirers of it, as if it could be usefully substituted in the place of Matter and Motion.

The Hypothesis, being in a sort sub­ordinate to that of the tria prima, in ascribing to two contrary saline Prin­ciples what vulgar Chymists do to their Salt, Sulphur, and Mercury; most of the objections we have made a­gainst the vulgar Chymical Doctrine, [Page 5] may, as I lately intimated, be applied, by a little variation, to this, and there­fore I shall need but to touch upon the main things that keep me from ac­quiescing in this Hypothesis.

CHAP. II.

AND first, it seems precarious to affirm, that in all bodies, or even in all the sensible parts of mixts, Acid and Alcalizate parts are found; there not having been, that I know, any Ex­perimental Induction made of parti­culars any thing near numerous enough to make out so great an asser­tion, and in divers bodies, wherein Experience is vouch'd for the inex­istence of these Principles, that Inex­istence is indeed proved not by direct and clear experience, but upon a sup­position, that such and such effects flow from the operations of the as­sumed Principles.

[Page 6] Some Spagyrists, when they see Aqua fortis dissolve Filings of Cop­per, conclude from thence, that the Acid spirits of the Menstruum meet in the metal with an Alcali upon which they work; which is but an unsafe way of arguing, since good Spirit of Urin, which they take to be a volatile Alcali, and which will make a great Conflict with Aqua fortis, will, as I have elsewhere noted, dissolve filings of Copper both readily enough and more genuinly than the Acid liquor is wont to do. So when they see the Magistery of Pearl or Coral, made by dropping oil of Tartar into the solutions of those bodies made with spirit of Vinegar, they ascribe the Precipitation to the fixt Alcali of the Tartar, that mortifies the Acidity of the spirit of Vinegar; whereas the Precipitation would no less insue, if, instead of Alcalizat oil of Tartar, we imploy that highly acid liquor which they call Oleum Sulphuris per Cam­panam.

[Page 7] I think also it may be doubted, whether those, I reason with, are so certain as they suppose, that at least when they can manifestly discover an Acid, for instance, in a body, the operation of that body upon another, which they judge to abound with an Alcali, must be the effect of a Con­flict between those two jarring Prin­ciples, or, if I may so call them, Duel­lists. For an Acid body may do ma­ny things, not simply as an acid, but on the score of a Texture or modificati­on, which endows it with other Qua­lities as well as Acidity, whose being associated with those other Qualities in some cases may be but accidental to the effect to be produced; since by one or more of these other Qualities the body may act in cases, where Pre­judice may make a Chymist consider nothing but Acidity. Thus when some Chymists see an acid Menstruum, as Aqua fortis, spirit of Salt, oil of Vi­triol, &c. dissolve Iron, they present­ly ascribe the effect to an Acidity of the liquors, whereas well dephlegmed [Page 8] Urinous Spirits, which they hold to have a great Antipathy to Acids, will, as I have tried in some of them, readi­ly enough dissolve crude Iron even in the Cold. And on the other side, Mercury will not work on the filings of Iron, though this be so open a metal that even weak liquors will do it; and yet if one should urge, that Quicksilver readily dissolves Gold in Amalgamation, he may expect to be told, according to their Doctrine, that Mercury has in it an occult acid, by which it performs the solution; whereas it seems much more proba­ble, that Mercury has Corpuscles of such a shape and size as fit them to in­sinuate themselves into the Commen­surate Pores they meet with in Gold, but make them unfit to enter readily the Pores of Iron, to which Nature has not made them congruous; as on the other side the saline Corpuscles of Aqua fortis will easily find admission into the Pores of Iron, but not into those of Gold, to which they do not correspond as they do to the others. [Page 9] And when a knife, whose blade is touched with a Load-stone, cuts bread and takes up filings of Iron, it does neither of them upon the score of Alcali and Acidum, but the one up­on the visible shape and the stiffness of the blade, and the other upon the latent Contrivance or change of Tex­ture produced by the operation of the Load-stone in the particles that compose the Steel.

This may perhaps be farther illu­strated by adding, that when blew Vitriol, being beaten and finely sear­ced, makes a white pouder, that whiteness is a quality which the pou­der has not as being of a Vitriolate Nature. For Rock-Crystal or Venice-glass being finely beaten will have the same operation on the Eye, but it proceeds from the transparen­cy of the body and the minuteness, multitude and confus'd scituation of the Corpuscles that make up the Pouder. And therefore, if other bo­dies be brought by Comminution in­to parts endow'd with such Mechani­cal [Page 10] affections, as we have named; these aggregates will act upon the or­gans of Sight as white bodies.

CHAP. III.

AND this leads me to another Exception against the Hypothe­sis of the Duellists, which is, that the Framers of it seem arbitrarily to have assigned Provinces or Offices to each of their two Principles, as the Chy­mists do to each of their tria prima, and the Peripateticks to each of their Four Elements. For 'tis not enough to Say, that an Acid, for instance, as such, performs these things, and an Alkali so many others, that they di­vide the Operations and Phaenomena of nature, or at least (as some, more cautious, are content to say) of mixt bodies between them; since Asserti­ons of such great moment ought not to be advanc'd or received without [Page 11] sufficient Proof. And perhaps the very distribution of Salts into Acids and Alcalies hath somewhat of arbi­trary in it, since others may, without assuming much more, take the free­dom to distribute them otherwise, there being not only several things wherein Acids and Alcalies agree, but also several things wherein Salts of the same denomination widely differ. As, for Instance, some Alkalies, accord­ing to those I reason with, are, like salt of Tartar, fixt, and will endure the violence of the fire; others, like salt of Urin or Harts-horn, are exceed­ingly fugitive, and will be driven up with a scarce sensible degree of Heat; some, as salt of Tartar, will precipitate the solution of Sublimate into an Orange-tawny; others, as spirit of Blood and Harts-horn, precipitate such a solution into a milky substance. Oil of Tartar will very slowly ope­rate upon filings of Copper, which Spirit of Urin and Harts-horn will readily dissolve in the Fire.

[Page 12] And among Acids themselves the difference is no less if not much greater. Some of them will dissolve bodies that others will not, as Aqua fortis will dissolve Silver and Mercu­ry, but leave Gold untouched; or as Aqua Regis, though made without Sal Armoniac that dissolves Gold readily, will dissolve Mercury but scurvily, and Silver not at all. And this may happen, when the Menstruum that will not dissolve the body is reputed much stronger than that which does; as dephlegm'd spirit of Vinegar will dissolve Lead, reduc'd to minute parts in the cold; which is an effect that Chymists are not wont to expect from Spirit of Salt. Nay, which is more, one Acid will precipitate what another has dissolved, and contrarily; as spirit of Salt will precipitate Silver out of spirit of Nitre. And I found oil of Vitriol to precipitate bodies of divers kinds, Minerals and others, out of some acid Menstruums, particularly spirit of Vinegar.

[Page 13] To this might be added the Pro­perties, peculiar to some particular Acids, as that Spirit of Nitre or Aqua fortis will dissolve Camphire into an Oil, and coagulate common oil into a consistent and brittle substance like Tallow; and, though it will both corrode Silver, Copper, Lead, and Mercury, and keep them dissolved, it will quickly let fall almost the whole body of Tin, very soon after it has corroded as much as it can of it. By all which, and some other like Instan­ces, I am induc'd to question, whether the Acidum and Alkali, we are speak­ing of, have the simplicity that Philo­sophy requires in Principles; and shall be kept from wondering, if others shall think it as free for them to constitute other Principles, as 'tis for the Learned men I reason with, to pitch upon Acidum and Alkali.

And some perhaps will be bold to say, that, since the former of those Principles comprehend such a number of bodies, that are, many of them, very differing, and some of them directly [Page 14] contrary in their operations, it seems a slight and not Philosophical Ac­count of their Nature, to define an Acid by its Hostility to an Alcali, which (they will say) is almost as if one should define a Man by saying, that he is an Animal that is at enmity with the Serpent; or a Lyon, that he is a fourfooted beast that flies from a Crowing Cock.

CHAP. IV.

BUT although one of the chiefest Conditions that Philosophers may justly require in Principles, is, that, being to explain other things, they should be very clear themselves; yet I do not much wonder, that the Definitions given us of Acidum and Alcali should be but unaccurate and superficial, since I find not, that they have themselves any clear and deter­minate Notion or sure marks, where­by to know them distinctly, without [Page 15] which Chymists will scarce be able to form clear and setled Notions of them. For to infer, as is usual, that, because a body dissolves another, which is dissoluble by this or that known acid, the Solvent must also be acid; or to conclude, that, if a body precipitates a dissolved metal out of a confessedly acid Menstruum, the Precipitant must be an Alcali, to argue thus, I say, 'tis unsecure; since, not to repeat what I said lately of Copper, I found, that filings of Spelter will be dissolved as well by some Alcalies, (as spirit of Sal Armoniac) as by Acids. And bodies may be precipitated out of acid Menstruums, both by other Acids, and by liquors, where there appears not the least Alcali: As I have found, that a solution of Tin-glass, made in Aqua fortis, would be precipitated both by Spirit of Salt and by common or rain water. And as for the other grand way that Chy­mists employ, to distinguish Acids and Alcalies, namely by the Heat, Commo­tion, and bubbles that are excited, [Page 16] upon their being put together, that may be no such certain sign as they presume, they having indeed a depen­dance upon particular Contextures and other Mechanical affections, that Chymists are not wont to take any notice of. For almost any thing that is fitted variously and vehemently to agitate the minute parts of a body, will produce Heat in it; and so, though water be neither an Acid nor an Alcalizate liquor, yet it would quickly grow very hot, not only with the highly acid Oil of Vitriol, but (as I have more than once pur­posely tried and found) with the fie­ry Alcalizat Salt of Tartar. And 'tis to be noted, that neither in the one nor the other of these Incalescent mixtures, there is produced any such visible or audible conflict, as, accord­ing to the Doctrine of the Chymists I reason with, one would expect. And as for the production of bubbles, especially if accompanied with a hissing noise, neither is that such a certain sign as Chymists imagine: For [Page 17] the production of bubbles is not a necessary effect or concomitant of Heat excited by Conflicts, but de­pends very much upon the peculiar Disposition of Bodies put together to extricate, produce, or intercept par­ticles of Air, (or Steams, for the time equivalent to them;) and therefore as Oil of Vitriol, mixt in a due proporti­on with fair water, may be brought to make the water too hot to be held in ones hand, without exciting bubbles; so I have found by trials purposely made, that Alcalizat Spirit of Urine drawn from some kinds of Quick-lime, being mixt with Oil of Vitriol moderately strong, would produce an intense Heat, whilest it produced ei­ther no manifest bubbles at all, or scarce any, though the Urinous Spi­rit was strong, and in other Trials operated like an Alcali; and although also with Spirit of Urin, made per se the common way, the oil of Vitriol will produce a great hissing and a multitude of conspicuous bubbles. [Page 18] On the other side I have sometimes, though not so constantly, found, that some Acid Spirits, especially that of Verdigrease made per se, would, when poured upon Salt of Tartar, make a Conflict with it, and produce a copi­ous froth, though we observed it not to be accompanied with any manifest Heat. And I elsewhere mention two bodies, upon whose putting together numerous bubbles would, for a long time, and not without noise, be gene­rated, and succeed one another, though I could perceive no Heat at all to accompany this Tumult.

As for the Tast, which by many is made a great Touchstone, whereby to know Acids and Alcalies, I consider that there is a multitude of mixt bo­dies, wherein we can so little discern by the Tast, which of the Principles is Predominant, that this Sense would not oblige one to suspect, much less to conclude, there were one grain of ei­ther of them to be found there; such bodies are Diamonds and Rubies, and [Page 19] most Gems, besides many ignobler Stones, and Gold and Silver and Mer­cury, and I know not how many other bodies. On the other side, there are bodies that abound with Acid or Al­calizat Salts, which either have no Tast, or a quite differing one from that of the Chymical Principle. As though Venice-glass be in great part composed of a fixt Alcali; yet to the Tongue it is insipid, and Crystalls of Lune and of Lead made with Aqua fortis, and containing great store of the Acid particles of the Menstruum, have nothing of Acidity in the mouth, the latter having a saccharine sweet­ness, and the former an extream bit­terness. And even in Vegetable sub­stances that have a manifest Tast, 'tis not so easie to know by that, whether it be the Acid or the Alcalizat Prin­ciple that is predominant in them; as in the Essential oils of Spices and o­ther Vegetables. And in the gross Empereumatical Oils of Woods, and even in high Rectified Spirit of Wine, [Page 20] which therefore some will have to be an Alcalizat liquor, and others list it among Acids, though I did not find it neither to be destroyed or much al­tered by being put upon Coral or salt of Tartar, as would happen to an acid Menstruum, nor yet by being digested with and distilled from sea Salt, as might be probably expected from an Alcalizat one: A and among those very bodies which their Tasts perswade Chymists to reckon amongst Acids, one may (according to what I formerly noted) observe so great a difference and variety of relishes, that, perhaps without being too severe, I may say, that if I were to allow Acids to be One Principle, it should be only in some such Metaphysical sense, as that wherein Air is said to be One Body, though it consist of the associated ef­fluviums of a multitude of Corpuscles of very differing Natures, that agree in very little save in their being mi­nute enough to concur to the Com­position of a fluid aggregate, consist­ing [Page 21] of flying parts. But having dwelt longer than I intended on One Obje­ction, 'tis time that I proceed to those that remain.

CHAP. V.

ANother particular, I am unsatis­fied with in the Hypothesis of Alcali and Acidum, is, that 'tis in divers cases either needless or useless to ex­plain the Phaenomena of Qualities, there being several of these produ­ced, destroyed, or altered, where there does not appear any accession, recess, or change of either of those two Principles; as when fluid water by hard beating is turn'd into consistent froth, and when transparent red Co­ral is, barely by being beaten and sifted finely, changed into a white and opacous powder; and as when a very flexible piece of fine silver being hammer'd is brought to have a brisk spring, and after a while will, instead [Page 22] of continuing malleable, crack or cleave under the hammer; and as when (to dispatch and omit other in­stances) a sufficiently thin leaf of Gold, held between the Light and the Eye, appears green.

Another thing (of kin to the for­mer,) that I like not in the Doctrine of Acidum and Alcali, is, that though the Patrons of it, whilest they would seem to constitute but two Principles, are fain (as I lately intimated) to make I know not how many differing sorts of Acids, besides some variety of Alca­lies; yet their Principles are too few and narrow to afford any satisfactory explication of the Phaenomena. For I fear, 'twill be very difficult for them to give a Rational Account of Gravi­ty, Springiness, Light, and Emphatical Colours, Sounds, and some other Qualities that are wont to be called manifest; and much more of several that are confest to be occult, as Ele­ctricity, and Magnetism; in which last I see not, how the affirming that [Page 23] there is in the Magnet an Acid and an Alcali, and that these two are of contrary Natures, will help to explain, how a Load-stone does, as they speak, attract the same end of a poised needle with one of its Poles, which 'twill drive away with the other, and determine that needle when freely placed, to point North and South, and enable it to communicate by its bare touch the same Properties, and abun­dance of other strange ones, to ano­ther piece of Steel. But I forbear to alledge particular Examples refer­rable to the several Qualities above-mentioned, whether manifest or hid­den, because that in great part is al­ready done in our Notes about parti­cular Qualities, in which 'twill appear how little able the employing of Al­cali and Acidum will be to afford us an account of many things. And though I enlarge not here on this objecti­on, yet I take it to be of that impor­tance; that, though there were no o­ther, this were enough to shew that [Page 24] the Hypothesis that is liable to it, is Insufficient for the explication of Qualities; and therefore 'twill not I presume be thought strange that I add, that, as for those that would ex­tend this narrow Chymical Doctrine to the whole object of Natural Philo­sophy, they must do more than I ex­pect they will be able before they can make me their Proselyte, there being a multitude of Phaenomena in nature (divers whereof I elsewhere take no­tice of in reference to the Chymists Philosophy) in which what Acidum and Alcali have to do, I confess I do not understand.

CHAP. VI.

THE last thing (which comprizes several others) that seems to me a defect in the Doctrine of Alcali and Acidum, is, that divers if not most of those very things that are preten­ded to be explicated by them, are not satisfactorily explicated, some things being taken into the explications that are either not fundamental enough or not clearly intelligible, or are charge­able with both those Imperfecti­ons.

And first I am dissatisfied with the very fundamental Notion of this Doctrine, namely a supposed Hostili­ty between the tribe of Acids and that of Alkalies, accompanied, if you will have it so, with a friendship or sympathy with bodies belonging to the same tribe or Family. For I look upon Amity and Enmity as Affecti­ons of Intelligent Beings, and I have [Page 26] not yet found it explained by any, how those Appetites can be placed in Bodies Inanimate and devoid of knowledge, or of so much as Sense. And I elsewhere endeavour to shew, that what is called Sympathy and Antipathy between such bodies does in great part depend upon the actings of our own Intellect, which, supposing in every body an innate appetite to preserve it self both in a defensive and an offensive way, inclines us to con­clude, that that body, which, though designlesly destroys or impairs the state or texture of another body, has an Enmity to it, though perhaps a slight Mechanical change may make bodys, that seem extreamly hostile, seem to agree very well and co­operate to the production of the same effects. As if the acid spirit of Salt and the volatile Alkali (as they will have it) that is commonly called Spirit of Urine be put together, they will, after a short though fierce con­flict, upon a new contexture unite to­gether [Page 27] into a Salt, little, if at all, differ­ing from Sal Armoniac, in which the two reconciled Principles will amica­bly join in cooling of water, dissolv­ing some metalline bodys, and produ­cing divers other effects. And so, if upon a strong solution of Salt of Pot-ashes or of Salt of Tartar, good Spirit of Nitre be dropt in a due propor­tion, after the Heat and Tumult and Ebullition are over, the Acid and the Alkalizat Salts will convene into such a Concretion as Salt-peter, which is taken to be a natural body, either ho­mogeneous, or at least consisting of parts that agree very friendly toge­ther, and conspire to constitute the particular kind of Salt that Chymists call Nitre.

But the Sympathy and Antipa­thy that is said to be betwixt Inani­mate bodys, I elsewhere more parti­cularly consider, and therefore I shall now add in the second place, That the Explications made of Phaenomena according to the Doctrine of Alcali [Page 28] and Acidum do not, in my apprehensi­on, perform what may be justly ex­pected from Philosophical Explicati­ons. 'Tis said indeed, that the Acidum working on the Alcali, or this upon that, produces the effect proposed; but that is only to tell us, what is the Agent that operates, and not the Man­ner of the operation, or the means and process whereby it produces the effect proposed, and 'tis this modus that Inquisitive Naturalists chiefly desire to learn. And if it be said, that it is by the mutual hostility of the Principles that the effect is produced, it may be answered, that besides, that that hostility it self is not, as we have just now observed, a thing clear, if so mucha s Intelligible; this is so gene­ral and indeterminate a way of expli­cating things, as can afford little or no satisfaction to a searching and cauti­ous Naturalist, that considers how ve­ry numerous and very various the Phaenomena of Qualities are.

CHAP. VII.

TO clear up and to countenance what I have been now saying, I shall only take notice of some few obvious Phaenomena of one of the most familiar Operations wherein Acidum and Alcali are supposed to be the grand Agents. 'Tis known to the very Boys of Chymists, that Aqua Regis will dissolve Gold, Cop­per, and Mercury, and that with these metals, especially with the second, it will produce an intense degree of heat. If now the Cause of this Heat be demanded, it may be ex­pected, that the Patrons of the Du­ellists will answer, that 'tis from the action of the Acid salts of the Men­struum upon the Alcali they meet with in the Metalls. But not to mention how many things are here presumed, not proved; nor that I know some Acid Menstruums, and [Page 30] some much more evidently Alcali­zate Bodys than these Metals are, which yet do not upon their mix­tures produce any sensible heat; not, I say, to mention these, it is easie to discern, that this answer names in­deed two supposed efficients of Heat, but does not explicate or declare how these Agents produce that Qua­lity, which depends upon a certain vehement and various agitation of the singly insensible parts of Bodys, whether the Duellists, or any other, though very differing, Causes put them into a motion so modified. And therefore Gold and Copper by bare Concussion may be brought to an intense degree of heat without the accession of any acid parts to work upon them. But then fur­ther, when we are told, that Aqua Regis by its Acidity working on the Metalline Alcali makes a dissolution of the Metal; I am told indeed what they think to be the Agent in this change, but not at all satisfied [Page 31] how this Agent effects it; for, Cop­per being a very hard metal, and Gold generally esteemed by Chy­mists the closest and compactest Bo­dy in nature, I would gladly know, by what power and way such weak and probably either brittle or flex­ible bodys as acid Salts, are enabled with that force to disjoin such so­lid and closely coherent Corpuscles as make up the visible masses of Copper and Gold, nay, and scat­ter them with that violence as per­haps to toss up multitudes of them into the air. And since in the disso­lution of these Metals there is ano­ther Phaenomenon to be accounted for, as well as the forcing of the parts asunder, namely the sustenta­tion of the Metal in the Menstruum, the Chymists would have much in­formed me, if they had well ex­plained, how their Acidum and Al­cali is able to sustain and give flui­dity to the Corpuscles of the dissolv­ed Metal, which though it be but [Page 32] Copper, is nine times as heavy as a bulk of water equal to it, and if it be Gold, is nineteen times heavier than the Liquor that must keep it from sinking; and at least divers times heavier in specie than the Salts, that are mingled with the aqueous parts, can make the Menstruum com­posed of them both. Whereas Trial has assured me, that, if a piece of Wax or any other such matter be made by less than the hundredth part heavier than an equal bulk of Water, it will, when thoroughly immersed, fall to the bottom and rest there. I might also ask a further Question about these Dissolutions, as why, whereas Aqua Regis dissolves Mercury without being much chan­ged in colour by it, Gold retains its own Citrinity or yellowness in the solvent, and the solution of Copper is of a colour, which being greenish­blew is quite differing from that of the metal that affords it, as well as from that of the solvent? And I [Page 33] might recruit these with other Que­ries not impertinent, but that these may suffice (for a sample) on this Occasion, and allow me to con­clude this Chapter, by represent­ing One thing which I would glad­ly recommend and inculcate to you, namely, that Those Hypotheses do not a little hinder the progress of Humane knowledge that introduce Morals and Politicks into the Ex­plications of Corporeal Nature, where all things are indeed trans­acted according to Laws Mechani­cal.

CHAP. VIII.

I Might easily have been more co­pious in the Instances annext to the foregoing Animadversions, but that, being desirous to be short as well as clear, I purposely declined to make use of divers others, that seemed proper to be employed, and indeed might safely enough have been so, because those I have men­tioned, and especially those, (which make a great part of them) that are Mechanical, are not liable to the same exceptions, that I foresaw might be made to elude the force of the Examples I passed by. And though I think I could very well make those foreseen Objections ap­pear groundless or unsatisfactory; yet that could scarce be done with­out engaging in Controversies that would prove more tedious than I judged them necessary.

[Page 35] And yet, although what I have said in this Excursion be but a part of what I could say, I would not be thought to have forgot what I intimated at the beginning of it. For though the Reasons I alledged keep me from acquiescing in the Doctrine of Alcali and Acidum, as 'tis proposed under the notion of a Philosophical Hypothesis, such as the Cartesian or Epicurean, which are each of them alledged by their em­bracers to be Mechanical, and of a very Catholick extent; yet I de­ny not, that the Consideration of the Duellists (or the two jarring Principles of Alcali and Acidum) may be of good use to Spagyrists and Physitians, as I elsewhere fur­ther declare. Nor do I pretend by the past discourse that questions one Doctrine of the Chymists, to beget a general contempt of their Noti­ons, and much less of their Experi­ments. For the operations of Chy­mistry may be misapplied by the er­roneous [Page 36] Reasonings of the Artists without ceasing to be themselves things of great use, as being appli­cable as well to the Discovery or Confirmation of solid Theories, as the production of new Phaenomena, and beneficial effects. And though I think, that many Notions of Para­celsus and Helmont and some other Eminent Spagyrists are unsolid, and not worthy the veneration that their Admirers cherish for them; yet di­vers of the Experiments, which ei­ther are alledged to favour these notions, or on other accounts are to be met with among the followers of these men, deserve the curiosity if not the esteem of the Industrious In­quirers into Natures Mysteries. And looking upon Chymistry in gross as a Discipline subordinate to Physiques, even Mechanical Philo­sophers may justly, in my opinion, think favourably of it, since, what­ever Imperfections, or, if they please, Extravagancies there may be in [Page 37] the Principles and Explications of Paracelsus or other Leading Artists, these faults of the Theorical part may be sufficiently compensated by the Utilities that may be deri­ved from the Practical part. And this I am the rather induced to say, because the Experiments, that Chymistry furnishes, may much assist a Naturalist to rectifie the Erroneous Theories that often­times accompany Them, and even those (Mistakes) that are endeavour'd to be evinced by them.

And (to conclude) Chymistry seems to deal with men in refe­rence to Notions, as it does in re­ference to Metals, assisting wary men to detect the Errors, unto which it may have missed the un­wary: For the same Art that has taught some to impose on o­thers, (and perhaps themselves first) by blanching Copper, imitating Gold, &c. does also supply Say-masters [Page 38] and Refiners, with the Means, by the Cupel, Cements, Aqua fortis, &c. to examine, whether Coins be true or false, and discover Adulte­rate Gold and Silver to be Counter­feit.

CHAP. I.

AS far as I have yet observed, the Qualifications or Attributes, on whose account a portion of matter is found to be Volatile, are chiefly four; whereof the three for­mer most regard the single Corpuscles [Page 4] as such; and the last, the manner of their Union in the aggregate or bo­dy they make up.

But before I enter upon particu­lars, give me leave to advertise you here once for all, That in the follow­ing Notes about Volatility and Fixt­ness, when I speak of the Corpuscles or minute parts of a body, I doe not mean strictly either the Elementary parts, such as Earth and Water, or the Hypostatical Principles, such as Salt, Sulphur, or Mercury; for these things come not here into considera­tion: But onely such Corpuscles, whether of a simple, compounded or decompounded Nature, as have the particles they consist of so firmly uni­ted, that they will not be totally dis­joyned or dissipated by that degree of Fire or Heat, wherein the matter is said to be volatile or to be fixt. But these combined particles will in their aggregate either aseend, or con­tinue unraised per modum Unius (as they speak) or as one intire Corpu­sole. As in a Corpuscle of Sal Armo­niac, [Page 5] whether it be a natural or fac­titious thing, or whether it be per­fectly similar, or compounded of dif­fering parts, I look upon the intire Corpuscle as a volatile portion of matter; and so I doe on a Corpuscle of Sulphur, though experience shews when 'tis kindled, that it has great store of acid Salt in it, but which is not extricated by bare sublimation: And so Colcothar of Vitriol falls un­der our consideration as a fixt body, without inquiring what cupreous or other mineral and not totally fixt parts may be united with the Earthly ones; since the fires, we expose it to, do not separate them.

And this being premised in the ge­neral, I now proceed to some parti­culars. And first to make a volatile body, the parts should be very small. For, coeteris paribus, those that are so, are more easily put into motion by the action of the fire and other A­gents, and consequently more apt to be elevated, when, by the determi­nation of the movent, the situation [Page 6] of the neighbouring bodies, or other Mechanical Circumstances, the agi­tated Corpuscles can continue their motion with less resistance upwards than any other way, (as either down­wards or horizontally.) And if, as 'tis highly probable, that which in light bodies, or at least in most of them, is wont to pass for positive Le­vity, be but a less degree of gravity than that of those contiguous bodies that raise them; it will happen, that in very many cases, (for I say not in all) the great proportion of the sur­face of a Corpuscle to its bulk, (which is usually greater in the lesser parti­cles) by making it more apt to be wrought on, either by the air agita­ted by the fire, or by the effluvia of kindled fuell, or by the impulse of the shaken Corpuscles of the body it self, will much facilitate the elevati­on of such a minute particle, by ex­posing a greater portion of it to the action of the agent, as it will often­times also facilitate the renewed su­stentation of such a small body in the [Page 7] air, which resists more the descent of particles whose surfaces are large, than of others of the same gravity and bulk: As a leaf of paper display­ed will much longer hover in the Air, than if it were reduced into a ball or pellet. That this minuteness of particles may dispose them to be carried upwards, by the impulse of other bodies and that of the agitated Air, is very obvious to be observed: As we see, that Horses in a high-way, though they be not able with the strokes of their feet to make stones, or gravel, or clods of Earth fly up, yet they will easily raise clouds of dust oftentimes mingled with the smaller grains of sand. And where Timber is sawing, the same wind that will not in the least move the beams, and scarce at all move the chips, will easily carry up the Saw-dust into the Air. And we see in our Chimneys, that the smoak readily ascends, whilst even small clods of soot, which is but an aggregate of the particles of smoak, fall headlong down.

CHAP. II.

THE next qualification requisite in the corpuscles of Volatile bodies is, that they be not too solid or heavy. For if they be so, though their bulk be very small, yet, unless other Circumstances do much com­pensate their weight, 'twill be very difficult to elevate them, because of the great disproportion of their spe­cific gravity to that of the Air, (which contributes to sustain and e­ven raise many sorts of volatile parts) and to the strength of the igneous effluvia or other agents that would carry them up. Thus we see, that filings of Lead or Iron, and even Minium (which is the calx of Lead) though the grains they consist of be very small, will not easily be blown up like common dust, or meal, or o­ther powders made of less ponderous materials.

A third Qualification to be desired in the corpuscles that should make [Page 9] up a Volatile body is, that they be conveniently shaped for motion. For if they be of branched, hook'd, or other very irregular or inconvenient figures, they will be apt to be stopt and detained by other bodies, or en­tangled among themselves, and con­sequently very difficult to be carried upwards, in regard that, whilst they are thus fastened either to one ano­ther, or to any stable body, each single Corpuscle is not onely to be considered, as having its own pecu­liar bulk, since its cohesion with the other corpuscle or body that detains it, makes them fit to be look'd upon per modum Unius; that degree of heat they are exposed to being pre­sumed uncapable of disjoyning them. And this may be one Reason, why Water, though it be specifically hea­vier than Oil, yet is much more easily brought to exhale in the form of va­pours than is Oil, whose corpuscles by the lasting stains they leave on cloath, wood, wool, &c. (which wa­ter will but transiently moisten, not [Page 10] stain) seems to be of very intangling figures.

The fourth and last qualification requisite in a Volatile body is, that the parts do loosely adhere, or at least be united in such a manner, as does not much indispose them to be separated by the fire in the form of fumes or vapours.

For he that considers the matter, will easily grant, that, if the contex­ture of the corpuscles, whereof a bo­dy consists, be intricate, or their co­hesion strong, their mutual implica­tion, or their adherence to each o­ther, will make one part hinder ano­ther from flying separately away, and their conjunction will make them too heavy or unweildy to be elevated to­gether, as intire though compounded parts. Thus we see, that in Spring, or the beginning of Summer, a wind, though not faint, is unable to carry off the lightest leaves of trees, be­cause they stick fast to the bows and twigs on which they grow, but in Autumn, when that adhesion ceases, [Page 11] and the leaves sit but loosely on, a wind no stronger than that they re­sisted before, will with ease blow them off, and perhaps carry them up a good way into the Air. But here note, that it was not without some cause, that I added above, that in a fluid body, the parts should at least be united in such a manner, as does not much indispose them to be sepa­rated. For 'tis not impossible, that the parts of a body may, by the fi­gures and smoothness of the surfaces, be sufficiently apt to be put into mo­tion, and yet be indisposed to admit such a motion as would totally sepa­rate them and make them fly up into the Air. As, if you take two pieces of very flat and well-polished marble or glass, and lay them one upon the other, you easily make them slide a­long each others surfaces, but not easily pull up one of them, whilest the other continues its station. And when Glass is in the state of fusion, the parts of it will easily slide along each other, (as is usual in those of o­ther [Page 12] fluids) and consequently change places, and yet the continuity of the whole is not intirely broken, but every corpuscle does somewhere touch some other corpuscle, and thereby maintain the cohesion that indisposes it for that intire separation accompanied with a motion upwards that we call avolation. And so, when Salt-peter alone, is in a Cruci­ble exposed to the fire, though a ve­ry moderate degree of it will suffice to bring the Salt to a state of fusion, and consequently to put the corpu­scles that compose it into a restless motion; yet a greater degree of heat, than is necessary to melt it, will not extricate so much as the Spirits, and make them fly away.

CHAP. III.

THE foregoing Doctrine of the Volatility of bodies may be as well illustrated as applied, if we proceed to deduce from it the gene­rall [Page 13] ways of Volatilization of bodies, or of introducing volatility into an assigned portion of matter. For these wayes seem not inconveniently reducible to five, which I shall seve­rally mention, though Nature and Art do usually imploy two or more of them in conjunction. For which Reason I would not, when I speak of one of these wayes, be understood as if, excluding the rest, I meant that no other concurred with it.

The first of the five ways or means of Volatilizing a body is, to reduce it into minute parts, and, caeteris paribus, the more minute they are the bet­ter.

That the bringing a body into ve­ry minute parts may much conduce to the volatilizing of it, may be ga­thered from the vulgar practice of the Chymists, who when they would sublime or distill Antimony, Sal Ar­moniac, Sea-salt, Nitre, &c. are wont to beat them to powders to fa­cilitate their receiving a further com­minution by the action of the fire. [Page 14] And here I observe, that in some bo­dies this comminution ought not to be made onely at first, but to be con­tinued afterwards. For Chymists find by experience, though perhaps with­out considering the reason of it, that Sea-salt and Nitre, will very hardly afford their Spirits in Distillations, without they be mingled with pow­dered clay or bole, or some such o­ther additament, which usually twice or thrice exceeds the weight of the Salt it self: Although these addita­ments, being themselves fixt, seem unlikely to promote the volatiliza­tion of the bodies mixt with them, yet by hindering the small grains of Salt to melt together into one lump or masse, and consequently by keep­ing them in the state of Comminuti­on, they much conduce to the driving up of the Spirits or the finer parts of the Salts by the operation of the fire.

But to prosecute a little what I was saying of the Conduciveness of bringing a body into small parts to [Page 15] the volatilization of it, I shall add, that in some cases the Comminution may be much promoted by employ­ing Physical, after Mechanical, ways; and that when the parts are brought to such a pitch of exiguity, they may be elevated much better than before. Thus, if you take filings of Mars, and mix them with Sal Armoniack, some few parts may be sublimed; but if, as I have done, you dissolve those fi­lings in good Spirit of Salt instead of Oil of Vitriol, and having coagula­ted the solution, you calcine the gree­nish Crystalls or vitriolum Martis that will be afforded, you may with ease, and in no long time, obtain a Crocus Martis of very fine parts; so that I remember, when we exquisitely min­gled this very fixt powder with a convenient proportion of Sal Armo­niac, and gradually press'd it with a competent fire, we were able to ele­vate at the first Sublimation a consi­derable part of it; and adding a like, or somewhat inferiour, proportion of fresh Sal Armoniac to the Caput Mor­tuum, [Page 16] we could raise so considerable a part of that also, and in it of the Crocus, that we thought, if we had had Conveniency to pursue the ope­ration, we should, by not many re­peated Sublimations, have elevated the whole Crocus, which (to hint that upon the by,) afforded a Sublimat of so very astringent a Tast, as may make the trial of it in stanching of blood, stopping of fluxes, and other cases, where potent astriction is de­sired, worthy of a Physicians Curio­sity.

CHAP. IV.

THE second means to volatilize bodies is, to rub, grind, or o­therwise reduce their corpuscles to be either smooth, or otherwise fitly shaped to clear themselves, or be dis­intangled from each other.

By reason of the minuteness of the corpuscles, which keeps them from being separately discernible by the [Page 17] Eye, 'tis not to be expected, that im­mediate and ocular Instances should be given on this occasion; but that such a change is to be admitted in the small parts of many bodies, brought to be volatile, seems highly proba­ble from the account formerly given of the requisites or conditions of Vo­latility, whose introduction into a portion of matter will scarce be ex­plicated without the intervention of such a change. To this second Instru­ment of Volatilization, in concur­rence with the first, may probably be referred the following Phaenome­na: In the two first-of which there is imployed no additional volatile In­gredient; and in the fourth, a fixt body is disposed to volatility by the operation of a Liquour, though this be carefully abstracted from it.

1. If Urine freshly made be put to distill, the Phlegm will first ascend, and the Volatile salt will not rise 'till that be almost totally driven away, and then requires a not inconsidera­ble degree of fire to elevate it. But, [Page 18] if you putrefie or digest Urine, though in a well-closed Glass-Vessel, for seven or eight weeks, that gentle warmth will make the small parts so rub against, or otherwise act upon, one another, that the finer ones of the Salt will perhaps be made more slender and light, and however will be made to extricate themselves so far as to become volatile, and, a­scending in a very gentle heat, leave the greatest part of the phlegm be­hind them.

2. So, if Must, or the sweet juice of Grapes, be distilled before it have been fermented, 'tis observed by Chymists, and we have tried the like in artificial Wine made of Raisins, that the phlegm, but no ardent Spirit, will ascend. But when this Liquour is reduced to Wine by fermentation, which is accompanied with a great and intestine commotion of the just­ling parts, hitting and rubbing against one another, whereby some proba­bly come to be broken, others to be variously ground and subtilized, the [Page 19] more subtile parts of the Liquour be­ing extricated, or some of the parts being, by these operations, brought to be subtile, they are qualified to be raised by a very gentle heat be­fore the phlegm, and convene into that fugitive Liquour, that Chymists, for its activity, call Spirit of Wine. Nor is it onely in the slighter Instan­ces afforded by Animals and Vegeta­bles, that Volatility may be effected by the means lately mentioned: For experience hath assured me, that 'tis possible, by an artificial and long di­gestion, wherein the parts have lei­sure for frequent justlings and attriti­ons, so to subtilize and dispose the corpuscles even of common Salt for Volatility, that we could make them ascend in a moderate fire of Sand without the help of Bole, Oil of Vi­triol, or any Volatilizing additament; and, which is more considerable, the Spirit would in rising precede the Phlegm, and leave the greatest part thereof behind it.

This intestine commotion of parts [Page 20] capable of producing Volatility in the more disposed portions of a body, though it be much more easie to be found in Liquours, or in moist and soft bodies, yet I have sometimes, though rarely, met with it in dry ones. And particularly I remember, that some years ago having, for trial sake, taken Mustard-seed, which is a body pregnant with subtile parts, and caused it to be distilled per se in a Re­tort, I had, as I hoped, (without any more ado,) a great many grains of a clear and figured Volatile salt at the very first distillation: which Experi­ment having, for the greater securi­ty, made a second time with the like success, I mentioned it to some Lo­vers of Chymistry, as what I justly supposed they had not heard of. I leave it to farther Inquiry, whether, in a body so full of Spirits as Mustard-seed, the action and re-action of the parts among themselves, perhaps pro­moted by just degrees of fire, might not suffice to make in them a change equivalent in order to Volatilization, [Page 21] and the yielding a Volatile Salt, to that which we have observed Fermen­tation and Putrefaction to have made in the juice of Grapes, Urine, and some other bodies. How far the like success may be expected in other Tri­alls, I cannot tell; especially not ha­ving by me any Notes of the events of some Attempts which that Inquiry put me upon: Onely I remember in general, that, as some trials, I made with other Seeds, and even with A­romatick ones, did not afford me any Volatile Salt; so the success of other trials made me now and then think, that some subjects of the Vegetable kingdom, whence we are wont to drive over acid Spirits, but no dry Salt, may be distilled with so luckily regulated a heat, as to afford some­thing, though but little, of Volatile Salt; and that perhaps more bodies would be found to doe so, were they not too hastily or violently prest by the fire, whereby such saline sche­matisms of the desired parts of the matter are (by being dissipated or [Page 22] confounded) destroyed or vitiated, as in a slow, dextrous, or fortunate way of management would come forth, not in a liquid, but a saline form. Of which Observation we may elsewhere mention some Instan­ces, and shall before the close of this Paper name one, afforded us by crude Tartar.

3. Though Silver be one of the fixedst bodies that we know of, yet that 'tis not impossible but that, chief­ly by a change of Texture, it may strangely be disposed to Volatility, I was induced to think by what I re­member once happened to me. A Gentleman of my acquaintance, stu­dious of Chymical Arcana, having lighted on a strange Menstruum, which he affirmed, and I had some cause to believe, not to be corrosive, he abstracted it from several metalls, (for the same Liquour would serve again and again,) and brought me the Remainders, with a desire that I would endeavour to reduce those of Lead and Silver into the pristine me­tals [Page 23] again, which he had in vain at­tempted to doe: whereupon, though I found the white Calx of Lead re­ducible, yet when I came to the Calx of Silver, I was not able to bring it into a body; and having at length melted some Lead in a gentle fire, to try whether I could make it swallow up the Calx, in order to a farther o­peration, I was not a little surprized to find, that this mild heat made the Calx of Silver presently fly away and sublime in the form of a farina volati­lis, which whitened the neighbouring part of the Chimney, as well as the upper part of the Crucible.

4. From that which Chymists themselves tell us, I think we may draw a good Argument ad hominem, to prove, that Volatility depends much upon the texture and other Mechanical affections of a body. For divers of those Hermetick Philoso­phers (as they are called) that write of the Elixir, tell us, that when their Philosophick Mercury or grand Sol­vent, being sealed up together with a [Page 24] third or fourth part of Gold in a glass-Egg, is kept in convenient degrees of fire, the whole matter, and conse­quently the Gold, will, by the mutu­al operation of the included Substan­ces, be so changed, that not onely 'twill circulate up and down in the glass, but, in case the digestion or de­coction should be broken off at a cer­tain inconvenient time, the Gold would be quite spoil'd, being, by the past and untimely-ended operation, made too Volatile to be reducible a­gain into Gold: whereas, if the decoc­tion be duly continued unto the end, not onely the Gold, but all the Philo­sophical Mercury or Menstruum will be turned into a Sulphur or powder of a wonderfully fixt nature. I know, there are several Chrysopaeans, that speak much otherwise of this Opera­tion, and tell us, that the Gold im­ployed about it must be Philosophick Gold: But I know too, that there are divers others (and those too none of the least candid or rational) that speak of it as I have done; and That [Page 25] is sufficient to ground an Argument on towards all those that embrace Their doctrine. And in this case 'tis considerable, that 'tis not by any superadded additament, that the most fixt body of Gold is made volatile, but the same massy matter, consi­sting of Gold and Philosophick Mer­cury, is, by the change of texture produced or occasioned by the va­rious degrees and operations of fire upon it, brought to be first Volatile, and then extreamly fixt. And having said this in reference to one tribe of the Modern Spagyrists; to another of them, the Helmontians, I think I can offer a good Argument ad hominem from the Testimony and Experiments of the Founder of their Sect.

5. The acute Helmont, among o­ther prodigious powers that he a­scribes to the Alkahest, affirms, that, by abstracting it frequently enough, it would so change all tangible bo­dies, and consequently stones and metals, that they might be distilled over into Liquours equiponderant [Page 26] to the respective bodies that afforded them, and having all the Qualities of Rain-water; which if they have, I need not tell you that they must be very Volatile. And I see not how those that admit the Truth of this strange Alkahestical operation, can well deny, that Volatility depends upon the Mechanical affections of matter, since it appears not, that the Alkahest does, at least in our case, work upon bodies otherwise than Mechanically. And it must be con­fest, that the same material parts of a portion of corporeal substance, which, when they were associated and contexed (whether by an Arche­us, seed, form, or what else you please,) after such a determinate man­ner, constituted a solid and fixt bo­dy, as a Flint or a lump of Gold; by having their Texture dissolved, and (perhaps after being subtilized) by being freed from their former impli­cations or firm cohesions, may be­come the parts of a fluid body total­ly Volatile.

CHAP. V.

THE fourth means of making a body Volatile is, by associa­ting the particles to be raised with such as are more Volatile than them­selves, and of a figure fit to be fastened to them, or are at least apt, by be­ing added to them, to make up with them corpuscles more disposed than they to Volatility. This being the grand Instrument of Volatilization, I shall spend somewhat the more time about it: But I shall first here a little explain the last clause, (that I may not be obliged to resume it elsewhere,) by intimating, that 'tis not impossible, that the particles of an additament, though not more volatile than those of the body 'tis mixt with, and per­haps though not volatile at all, will yet conduce to volatilize the body wherewith 'tis mingled. For the par­ticles of the additament may be of such figures, and so associated with those of the body to be elevated, [Page 28] as in this to enlarge the former pores, or produce new ones, by intercep­ting little cavities (for they must not be great ones) between the particles of a body to be raised, and those of the additament. For, by these and other such ways of association, the corpuscles, resulting from the com­bination or coalition of two or more of these differing particles, may, without becoming too big and un­wieldy, become more conveniently shaped, or more light in proportion to their bulk, and so more easily buoyed up and sustained in the air, (as when the Lid of a Copper-box being put on, makes the whole box emerge and swim in water, because of the intercepted cavity, though nei­ther of the parts of the box would doe so,) or otherwise more fitted for avolation than the particles them­selves were before their being joined to those of the additament.

By two things chiefly the corpu­scles of the additament may contri­bute to the elevation of a body. For [Page 29] first, the parts of the former may be much more disposed for avolation than is necessary to their own Vola­tility. As when in the making of Sal Armoniac, the saline particles of Urine and of Soot are more fugitive than they need be to be themselves sublimed, and thereby are advanta­ged to carry up with them the more sluggish corpuscles whereof Sea-salt consists. And next, they may be of figures so proper to fasten them well to the body to be elevated, that the more fugitive will not be driven a­way or disjoyned from the more fixt by such a degree of Heat as is suffici­ent to raise them both together: To which effect the congruity or figura­tion is as well required, as the light­ness or volatility of the particles of the additament. And therefore some of the fugitivest bodies that we know, as Spirit of Wine, Cam­phire, &c. will not volatilize many bodies which will be elevated by far less fugitive additaments; because the corpuscles of Spirit of Wine stick [Page 30] not to those of the body they are mingled with, but, easily flying up themselves, leave those behind them, which they did rather barely touch than firmly adhere to: Whereas far less fugacious Liquours, if they be indowed with figures that fit them for a competently firm cohesion with the body they are mingled with, will be able to volatilize it. Of which I shall now give you some Instances in bodies that are very ponderous, or very fixt, or both.

And I shall begin with Colcothar, though it being a vitriolate calx, made by a lasting and vehement fire, 'tis (consequently) capable of resisting such a one. This being exquisitely ground with an equal weight of Sal Armoniac, which is it self a Salt but moderately volatile, will be in good part sublimed into those yellow Flowers, which we have elsewhere more particularly taught to prepare, under the name of Ens primum Vene­ris; in which, that many vitriolate corpuscles of the Colcothar are really [Page 31] elevated, you may easily find by put­ting a grain or two of that reddish Substance into a strong infusion of Galls, which will thereby immediate­ly acquire an inky colour.

Steel also, which, to deserve that name, must have endured extraordi­nary violences of the fire, and grea­ter than is needfull to obtain other metalls from their Mother Earth; Steel it self, I say, being reduced to filings, and diligently ground with a­bout an equal weight of Sal Armo­niac, will, if degrees of fire be skil­fully administred, (for 'tis easie to err in that point,) without any pre­vious calcination or reduction to a Crocus, suffer so much of the metall to be carried up, as will give the Sal Armoniac a notable colour, and an ironish tast.

And here it will be proper to ob­serve, for the sake of practical Chy­mists, that the Quantity or Propor­tion of the Volatile additament is to be regarded; though not so much as its Nature, yet more than it is wont [Page 32] to be: And divers bodies, that are thought either altogether unfit for Sublimation, or at least uncapable to have any considerable portion of them elevated, may be copiously e­nough sublimed, if a greater propor­tion of the additament, than we usual­ly content our selves with, be skil­fully imployed. And in the new­ly-mentioned Instance of Filings of Steel, if, in stead of an equal weight of Sal Armoniac, the treble weight be taken, and the operation be duly managed, a far greater quan­tity of the metall may be raised, espe­cially if fresh Sal Armoniac be care­fully ground with the Caput Mortuum. And Sal Armoniac may perhaps be compounded with such other bodies, heavier than it self, as may qualifie it, when it is thus clogged, to elevate some congruous bodies better than it would of it self alone. And I shall venture to add this farther Ad­vertisement, That if, besides the plen­ty of the additament, there be a suf­ficient fitness of its particles to lay [Page 33] hold on those of the body to be wrought on, Mineral bodies, and those ponderous enough, may be em­ployed to volatilize other heavy bo­dies. And I am apt to think, that al­most, if not more than almost, all Metalls themselves may by copious additaments and frequent Cohobati­ons be brought to pass through the neck of the Retort in distillation; and perhaps, if you melt them not with equal parts, but with many parts of Regulus of Antimony, and then proceed as the hints now given will direct you, you will not find cause to despise what I have been saying.

You know what endeavours have been, and are still fruitlessly, imployed by Chymists to elevate so fixt a body as Salt of Tartar by additaments. I shall not now speak much of the en­terprize in generall, designing chief­ly to tell you on this occasion, that, whereas frequent experience shews, that Sal Armoniac being abstracted from Salt of Tartar, not onely the [Page 34] Salt of Tartar is left at the bottom, but a good part of the Sal Armoniac is left behind with it; I suspected the cause might be, that Sal Armoniac, by the operation of the Alkaly of Tartar, is reduced into Sea-salt, and Urinous or fuliginous Salt, as 'twas at first composed of those differing In­gredients; and that by this means the volatil Salt being loosened or disintangled from the rest, and being of a very fugacious Nature, flyes easily away it self, without staying long enough to take up any other Salt with it. And therefore, if this Analysis of the Sal Armoniac could be prevented, it seemed not impos­sible to me, that some part of the Salt of Tartar, as well as of Colco­thar and Steel, might be carried up by it: And accordingly having cau­sed the Ingredients to be exceedingly well dryed, and both nimbly and carefully mixt, and speedily exposed to the fire, I have sometimes had a portion of Salt of Tartar carried up with the Sal Armoniac: but this hap­pened [Page 35] so very rarely, that I suspected some peculiar fitness for this work in some parcels of Sal Armoniac, that are scarce but by the effect to be dis­cerned from others. But however, what has happened to us may argue the Possibility of the thing, and may serve to shew the volatilizing efficacy of Sal Armoniac; which is a Com­pound, that I elsewhere recommend, and doe it now again, as one of the usefullest Productions of vulgar Chy­mistry.

And since I have mentioned the Volatilization of Salt of Tartar, pre­suming your Curiosity will make you desire my Opinion about the Possibi­lity of it, I shall propose to you a distinction, that perhaps you doe not expect, by saying, that I think there is a great deal of difference between the making a Volatile Salt of Tartar, and the making Salt of Tartar Vo­latile. For, though this seem to be but a Nicety, yet really it is none; and it is very possible, that a man may from Tartar obtain a Volatile salt, [Page 36] and yet be no wise able to volatilize that Tartareous Salt, that has been once by the incineration of the Tar­tar brought to fixt Alkaly. I have in the Sceptical Chymist summarily delivered a way, by which both I, and some Spagyrists that learned it of me, obtained from a mixture of Antimony, Nitre, and crude Tartar, a Volatil salt, which in probability comes from the last named of those three bodies; but experience care­fully made has assured me, that with­out any additament, by a distillation warily and very slowly made, (inso­much that I have spent near a week in distilling one pound of matter) very clean Tartar, or at least the Crystalls of Tartar, may, in conve­niently shaped Vessels, be brought to afford a Substance that in Recti­fication will ascend to the upper part of the Vessel, in the form of a Vola­til Salt, as if it were of Urine or of Harts-horne; of which (Tartareous) Salt, I keep some by me: But this operation requires not onely a dex­terous, [Page 37] but a patient distiller.

But now as to the making a fixt Alkaly of Tartar become Volatil, I take it to be another, and have found it to be a far more difficult, work; the common Processes of performing it being wont to promise much more than they can make good; which I may justly say of some other, that private men have vaunted for great Arcana, but upon triall have satisfied me so little, that I have divers times offered pretenders to make Salt of Tartar Volatil, that without at all inquiring into their Processes, I would lay good wagers, that they could not doe what they pretended; not onely as divers Philosophical Spagyrists re­quire, without any visible additament, but by any additament whatever; provided I were allowed to bring the Salt of Tartar my self, and to examine the Success, not by what may appear in the Alembic and Receiver, but by the weight of what would remain in the bottom. For I have convin­ced some of the more Ingenuous Ar­tists, [Page 38] that the Salt that sublimed was not indeed the Alkaly of Tartar, but somewhat that was by the operation produced, or rather extricated out of the additaments. But yet I would not be thought to affirm, that 'tis not possible to elevate the fixt Salt of Tartar. For sometimes I have been able to doe it, even at the first Di­stillation, by an artificial additament perhaps more fixt than it self; but, though the operation was very grate­full to me, as it shewed the Possibili­ty of the thing, yet the paucity of the Salt sublimed and other Circum­stances, kept me from much valuing it upon any other account. And there are other wayes, whereby Experi­ence has assured me, that Salt of Tartar may be raised. And if one of them were not so uncertain, that I can never promise before hand that it will at all succeed, and the other so laborious, difficult and costly, that few would attempt or be able to practice it, I should think them ve­ry valuable things; since by the for­mer [Page 39] way most part of the Salt of Tartar was quickly brought over in the form of a Liquor, whose pier­cing smell was scarce tolerable; and by the latter way some Salt of Tar­tar of my own, being put into a Re­tort, and urged but with such a fire as could be given in a portable Sand-furnace, there remained not at the bottom near one half of the first weight, the additament having car­ried up the rest, partly in the form of a Liquor, but chiefly in that of a white Sublimate, which was neither ill-sented, nor in tast corrosive, or alcalizat, but very mild, and some­what sweetish. And I doe not much doubt, but that by other wayes the fixt Alkaly of Tartar may be eleva­ted, especially if, before it be expo­sed to the last operation of the fire, it be dextrously freed from the most of those Earthy and Viscous parts, that I think may be justly suspected to clog and bind the truly saline ones.

But I have too long digrest, and therefore shall intimate onely upon [Page 40] the by, that even the spurious Sal Tartari volatilized that is made with Spirit of Vinegar, may, if it be well prepared, make amends for its Empy­reumatical smell and tast, and may, notwithstanding them, in divers ca­ses be of no despicable use, both as a Medicine, and a Menstruum.

CHAP. VI.

BEfore I draw towards a Conclu­sion of these Notes about Vo­latility, perhaps it will not be amiss, to take notice of a Phaenomenon, which may much surprise, and some­times disappoint those that deal in Sublimations, unless they be fore­warned of it. For though it be taken for granted, and for the most part may justly be so, that by carefully mingling what is sublimed with what remains, and re-subliming the mix­ture, a greater quantity of the bo­dy to be sublimed may be elevated the second time than was the first, [Page 41] and the third time than the second, and so onwards; yet I have not found this Rule alwayes to hold, but in some Bodies, as particularly in some kinds of dulcified Colcothar, the Sal Armoniac, would at the first Sublima­tion carry up more of the fixed pow­der, than at the second or third. So that I was by several Tryalls per­swaded, when I found a very well and highly coloured powder eleva­ted, to lay it by for use, and thereby save my self the labour of a prose­cution, that would not onely have proved useless, but prejudicial. And if I misremember not, by often re­peated Cohobations, (if I may so call them) of Sal Armoniac upon crude o [...] Mineral Antimony, though the Sublimate that was obtained by the first Operation, was much of it vari­ously, and in some places richly, co­loured; yet afterwards, the Salt a­scended from time to time paler and paler, leaving the Antimony behind it. Which way of making some Minerals more fixt and fusible I con­ceive [Page 42] may be of great use in some Medicinal Preparations, though I think it not fit to particularize them in this place: Where my chief in­tent was, to mention the Phaenome­non it self, and invite you to con­sider, whether it may be ascribed to this, that by the reiterated action of the fire, and grinding together of the body to be raised, either the corpu­scles of the Sal Armoniac, or those of the other body, may have those little hooked or equivalent particles, whereby they take hold of one an­other, broken or worn off; and whe­ther the indisposedness of the Colco­tharine or Antimonial parts to ascend, may not in some cases be promoted by their having, by frequent attri [...] ­o [...]s, so smoothed their Surfaces that divers of them may closely adhere, like pieces of polished Glass, and so make up Clusters too unweildy to be so raised, as the single corpuscles they consist of, were. Which change may dispose them to be at once less Volatil and more Fusible. Which [Page 43] Conjectures I mention to excite you to frame better, or at least to make amends for my omission of examin­ing these, by trying whether the Sal Armoniac grown white again will be as fit as it was at first to carry up fresh bodies; and also by observing the weight of the unelevated part, and employing those other wayes of examen, which I should have done, if I had not then made Subli­mations for another end, than to clear up the Doctrine of Volati­lity.

And here it may be profitable to some Chymists, though not necessary to my Subject, to intimate, that Sub­limations may be useful to make very fine Comminutions of divers bodies. That those that are elevated are re­duced to a great fineness of parts, is obvious to be observed in many Ex­amples, whence it has been ancient­ly, not absurdly, said, that Sublima­tions are the Chymists Pestles, since (as in Flowers of Sulphur and Anti­mony) they do really resolve the [Page 44] elevated bodies into exceeding fine Flower, and much finer than Pestles and Mortars are wont to bring them to. But that which I intend in this Paragraph is not a thing so obvious, since 'tis to observe, that sometimes even bodies so fixt as not at all to a­scend in Sublimation, may yet be re­duced by that operation into pow­ders extreamly fine. For exemplify­ing of which, I shall put you in mind, that though Spagyrists complain much of the Difficulty of making a good Clax of Gold, and of the Imperfe­ction of the few ordinary processes prescribed to make it, (which would be more complained of, but that Chymical Physicians seldom attempt to prepare it,) yet we are informed by triall, that by exactly grinding a thick amalgam of Gold and Mercury with a competent weight, (at least equal to its own) of finely powdered Sulphur, we may, by putting the mixture to su­blime in a conveniently shaped Glass, by degrees of fire obtain a Cinaber that will leave behind it a finer Clax [Page 45] of Gold than will be had by some far more difficult processes.

But 'tis now time to draw towards a Conclusion of our Notes about Vo­latility; which Quality depends so much upon the contexture of the corpuscles that are to be raised to­gether, that even very ponderous bodies may serve for volatilizing ad­ditaments, if they be disposed to fa­sten themselves sufficiently to the bo­dies they are to carry up along with them. For, though Lead be, save one, the heaviest solid we know of, and though Quick-silver be the heaviest body in the world, except Gold; yet trialls have assured us, that Quick-silver it self being united by Amalgamation with a small pro­portion of Lead, will by a fire that is none of the violentest, and in close Vessels, be made to carry over with it some of the Lead. As we clearly found by the increased weight of the Quick-silver that passed into the Receiver; which, by the way, may make us cautious how we conclude Quick-silver [Page 46] to be pure, meerly from its ha­ving been distilled over.

There remains but one body more heavy than those I come from naming, and that is Gold; which, be­ing also of a fixity so great that 'tis in­deed admirable, I doe not wonder that not onely the more wary Natu­ralists, but the more severe among the Chymists themselves should think it incapable of being volatilized. But yet, if we consider, how very minute parts Gold may be rational­ly supposed to consist of, and to be divisible into, me thinks it should not seem impossible, that, if men could light on Volatil Salts endowed with figures fit to stick fast to the corpu­scles of the Gold, they would carry up with them bodies, whose solidity can scarce be more extraordinary than their minuteness is: And in ef­fect, we have made more than one Menstruum, with which some particles of Gold may be carried up. But when I employed that which I recom­mended to you formerly under the [Page 47] name of Menstruum peracutum (which consists mainly, and sometimes onely, of Spirit of Nitre, several times drawn from Butter of Antimony,) I was able, without a very violent fire, in a few hours to elevate so much crude Gold, as, in the neck of the Retort, afforded me a considerable Quantity of Sublimate, which I have had red as blood, and whose consisting partly of Gold manifestly appeared by this, that I was able with ease to reduce that metall out of it.

In reckoning up the Instruments of Volatilization, we must not quite leave out the mention of the Air, which I have often observed to faci­litate the elevation of some bodies even in close Vessels; wherein, though to fill them too full be judged by ma­ny a Compendious practise, because the steams have a less way to ascend, yet Experience has several times in­formed me, that, at least in some ca­ses, they take wrong measures, and that (to pass by another Cause of their disappointment) a large propor­tion [Page 48] of Air, purposely left in the Ves­sels, may more than compensate the greater space that is to be ascended by the vapours or exhalations of the matter that is to be distilled or subli­med. And if, in close Vessels, the presence of the Air may promote the ascension of bodies, it may well be expected, that the elevation of di­vers of them may be furthered by being attempted in open Vessels, to which the Air has free access. And if we may give any credit to the pro­bable Relations of some Chymists, the Air does much contribute to the volatilization of some bodies that are barely, though indeed for no short time, exposed to it. But the account on which the Air by its bare presence or peculiar operations conduces to the Volatilization of some bodies, is a thing very difficult to be determi­ned, without having recourse to some Notions about Gravity and Levity, and of the Constitution of the cor­puscles that compose the Air; which I take to be both very numerous and [Page 49] no less various. And therefore I must not in these occasional Notes lanch out into such a Subject, though, for fear I should be blamed for too much slighting my old acquaintance the Air, I durst not quite omit the power it has to dispose some bodies to Volatility.

A moderate attention may suffice to make it be discerned, that in what hath been hitherto delivered, I have for the most part considered the small portions of matter, to be elevated in Volatilization, as intire Corpuscles: And therefore it may be now perti­nent, to intimate in a Line or two, that there may be also Cases, where­in a kind of Volatilization, improper­ly so called, may be effected, by ma­king use of such additaments as break off or otherwise divide the particles of the corpuscles to be elevated, and by adhering to, and so clogging, one of the particles to which it proves more congruous, inable the other, which is now brought to be more light or disingaged, to ascend. This [Page 50] may be illustrated by what happens, when Sal Armoniac is well ground with Lapis Calaminaris or with some fix'd Alkali, and then committed to distillation: For the Sea-salt, that enters the Composition of the Sal Armoniac, being detained by the stone or the Alkali, there is a divorce made between the common Salt and the urinous and fuliginous Salts, that were incorporated with it, and being now disingaged from it, are easily e­levated. I elsewhere mention, that I have observed in Man's Urine a kind of native Sal Armoniac, much less Volatile than the fugitive that is sublim'd from Man's Blood, Harts-horn, &c. and therefore supposing, that a separation of parts may be made by an Alkali, as well in this Salt as in the common factitious Sal Ar­moniac, I put to fresh Urine a con­venient proportion (which was a plentifull one) of Salt of Pot-ashes (that being then at hand) and distil­ling the Liquor, it yielded, accor­ding to expectation, a Spirit more Vo­latile [Page 51] than the Phlegm, and of a ve­ry piercing tast; which way of ob­taining a Spirit without any violence of fire, and without either previ­ously abstracting the Phlegm, (as we are fain to do in fresh Urine) or te­diously waiting for the fermentation of stale Urine, I taught some Chy­mists, because of the usefulness of Spirit of Urine; which being obtain­ed this innocent way, would proba­bly be employed with much less su­spicion of corrosiveness, than if in the operation I had made use of Quick-lime. Another Illustration of what I was not long since saying, may be fetch'd from the Experiment of making Spirit of Nitre by mixing Salt-peter with Oil of Vitriol, and distilling them together: For the Oil does so divide or break the cor­puscles of the Nitre, that the now­disposed particles of that Salt, which amount to a great portion of the whole, will be made easily enough to ascend even with a moderate fire of Sand, and sometimes without any [Page 52] fire at all, in the form of Spirits, ex­ceeding unquiet, subtle, and apt to moak away.

To which Instances of this imper­fect kind of Volatilization more might be added, but that you may well think, I have detain'd you but too long already with indigested Notes about one Quality.

CHAP. VII.

THe last means of Volatilizing bodies is, the operation of the Fire or some other actual Heat: But of this, which is obvious, it would be superfluous to discourse. Onely this I shall intimate, that there may be bodies, which, in such degrees of fire as are wont to be given in the vulgar operations of Chymists, will not be elevated, which yet may be forced up by such violent and lasting fires, as are employed by the Melters of Ores, and Founders of Guns, and sometimes by Glass-makers. And on [Page 53] this Consideration I shall here ob­serve to you, since I did not doe it at my entrance on these Notes, that Chymists are wont to speak, and I have accordingly been led to treat, of Volatility and Fixity in a popular sense of those Terms. For if we would consider the matter more strictly, I presume we should find that Volatility and Fixity are but re­lative Qualities, which are to be esti­mated, especially the former of them, by the degree of fire to which the body, whereto we ascribe one or other of those Qualities, is exposed; and therefore it is much more difficult than men are aware of, to determine accurately, when a body ought to be accounted Volatile and when not; since there is no determinate degree of Heat agreed on, nor indeed easie to be devised, that may be as a stan­dard, whereby to measure Volatility and Fixtness: And 'tis obvious, that a body, that remains fixt in one de­gree of fire, may be forced up by a­nother. To which may be added, [Page 54] agreeably to what I lately began to observe, that a body may pass for absolutely fixt among the generality of Chymists, and yet be unable to persevere in the fires of Founders and Glass-makers: Which brings into my mind, that not having observed, that Chymists have examined the Fixity of other bodies than metalline ones by the Cupel, I had the Curiosity to put dry Salt of Tartar upon it, and found, as I expected, that in no long time it manifestly wasted in so vehe­ment a heat, wherein also the Air came freely at it, (though Quick-lime, handled after the same way, lost not of its weight,) and having well mix­ed one ounce of good Salt of Tar­tar with treble its weight of Tobac­co-pipe Clay, we kept them but for two, or at most three hours, in a strong fire; yet the Crucible being purposely left uncovered, we found the Salt of Tartar so wasted, that the remaining mixture (which was not flux'd) afforded us not near a quarter of an ounce of Salt. And indeed I [Page 55] scarce doubt, but that in strictness di­vers of those bodies that pass for ab­solutely fixt, are but semi-fixt, or at least but comparatively and relative­ly fix'd, that is, in reference to such degrees of fire, as they are wont to be exposed to in the Distillations, Sublimations, &c. of Chymists; not such as are given in the raging fires of Founders, and Glass-makers. And per­haps even the fires of Glass-makers and Say-masters themselves are not the most intense that may possibly be made in a short time, provided there be but small portions of matter to be wrought on by them. And in effect, I know very few bodies, be­sides Gold, that will persevere totally fixt in the vehementest degrees of fire that Trials have made me acquainted with. And I elsewhere tell you, that, though Tin, in our Chymical Rever­beratories themselves, is wont to be reduced but into a Calx that is repu­ted very fixt; yet in those intense fires, that a Virtuoso of my acquain­tance uses in his Tin-Mines, there is [Page 56] not seldom found quantities of Tin carried up to a notable height in the form of a whitish powder, which, being in good masses forced off from the places to which it had fastened it self, does by a skillful reduction yield many a pound weight of good mal­leable metal, which seemed to me to be rather more, than less, fine than ordinary Tin.

CHAP. I.

FIXITY being the opposite Qua­lity to Volatility, what we have discoursed about the latter, will make the nature of the former more easily understood, and upon that account allow me to make somewhat the quicker dispatch of what I have to say of it.

[Page 4] The Qualifications that conduce most to the Fixity of a portion of mat­ter, seem to be these.

First, the grossness or the bulk of the corpuscles it consists of. For if these be too big, they will be too unwieldy and unapt to be carried up into the Air by the action of such mi­nute particles as those of the Fire, and will also be unfit to be buoyed up by the weight of the Air; as we see, that Vapours, whilst they are such, are small enough to swim in the Air, but can no longer be sustained by it, when they convene into drops of rain or flakes of snow. But here it is to be observed, that when I speak of the corpuscles that a fixt body consists of, I mean not either its Elementary or its Hypostatical Principles, as such, but onely those very little masses or clusters of particles, of what kind so­ever they be, that stick so firmly to one another, as not to be divisible and dissipable by that degree of fire in which the body is said to be fixt; so that each of those little Concreti­ons, [Page 5] though it may it self be made up of two, three, or more particles of a simpler nature, is considered here per modum Unius, or as one intire cor­puscle. And this is one Qualification conducive to the Fixtness of a bo­dy.

The next is the ponderousness or solidity of the corpuscles it is made up of. For if these be very solid, and (which solid and compact bodies usually are) of a considerable speci­fick gravity, they will be too heavy to be carried up by the effluvia or the action of the fire, and their pon­derousness will make them as unwiel­dy, and indisposed to be elevated by such Agents, as the grossness of their bulk would make bigger corpuscles, but of a proportionably inferiour specifick weight. On which account the calces of some metals and mine­rals, as Gold, Silver, &c. though, by the operation of Solvents, or of the fire, or of both, reduced to powders exceedingly subtile, will resist such vehement fires, as will easily drive [Page 6] up bigger, but less heavy and com­pact, corpuscles, than those calces consist of.

The third Qualification that con­duces to the Fixity of a body, be­longs to its Integral parts, not barely as they are several parts of it, but as they are aggregated or contexed in­to one body. For, the Qualification, I mean, is the ineptitude of the com­ponent corpuscles for avolation, by reason of their branchedness, irre­gular figures, crookedness, or other inconvenient shape, which intangles the particles among one another, and makes them difficult to be extricated; by which means, if one of them do ascend, others, wherewith 'tis com­plicated, must ascend with it; and, whatever be the account on which divers particles stick firmly together, the aggregate will be too heavy or unwieldy to be raised. Which I therefore take notice of, because that, though usually 'tis on the rough­ness and irregularity of corpuscles, that their cohesion depends; yet it [Page 7] sometimes happens, that the smooth­ness and flatness of their surfaces makes them so stick together, as to resist a total divulsion; as may be illustrated by what I have said of the cohesion of polished marbles and the plates of glass, and by the fixity of glass it self in the fire.

From this account of the Causes or Requisites of Fixity, may be dedu­ced the following means of giving or adding Fixation to a body, that was before either Volatile, or less fixt. These means may be reduced to two general Heads; First, the action of the Fire, as the parts of the body, exposed to it, are thereby made to operate variously on one another. And next, the association of the par­ticles of a volatile body with those of some proper additament: Which term, [of proper] I rather imploy than that, one would expect, [of fixt;] because 'twill ere long appear, that, in certain cases, some volatile bodies may more conduce to the fixation of other volatile bodies, than some fixt [Page 8] ones doe. But these two Instruments of Fixation being but general, I shall propose four or five more particular ones.

CHAP. II.

AND first, in some cases it may conduce to Fixation, that, either by an additament, or by the operati­on of the fire, the parts of a body be brought to touch each other in large portions of their surfaces. For, that from such a contact there will follow such a mutual cohesion, as will at least indispose the touching corpu­scles to suffer a total divulsion, may appear probable from what we late­ly noted of the cohesion of pieces of marble and glass, and from some o­ther Phaenomena belonging to the Hi­story of Firmness, from which we may properly enough borrow some instances, at least for illustration, in the Doctrine of Fixtness, in regard that usually, though not always, [Page 9] the same things that make a body Firm, give it some degree of Fixity, by keeping it from being dissipated by the wonted degrees of Heat, and Agitation it meets with in the Air. But to return to the contact we were speaking of, I think it not impossible, (though you may perhaps think it strange,) that the bare operation of the Fire may, in some cases, procure a Cohesion among the particles, (and consequently make them more Fixt,) as well as in others disjoyn them, and thereby make them more Volatile. For, as in some bodies, the figures and sizes of the corpuscles may be such, that the action of the fire may rub or tear off the little beards or hooks, or other particles that intangle them, and by that means make it more easie for the corpuscles to be disingaged and fly upwards; so in other bodies, the size and shape of the corpuscles may be such, that the agitation, cau­sed by the fire, may rub them one against the other, so as by mutual at­trition to grind, as 'twere, their [Page 10] surfaces, and make them so broad and smooth, if not also so flat, as that the contact of the corpuscles shall come to be made according to a large portion of their superficies, from whence will naturally follow a firm Cohesion. Which I shall illustrate by what we may observe among those that grind glasses for Telescopes and Microscopes. For, these Artificers, by long rubbing a piece of glass a­gainst a metalline Dish or concave Vessel, do by this attrition at length bring the two bodies to touch one another in so many parts of their congruous surfaces, that they will stick firmly to one another, so as sometimes to oblige the Work-man to use violence to disjoyn them. And this instance (which is not the sole I could alleage) may suffice to shew, how a Cohesion of corpuscles may be produced by the mutual ad­aptation of their congruous surfa­ces. And if two grosser corpuscles, or a greater number of smaller, be thus brought to stick together, you will [Page 11] easily believe, their Aggregate will prove too heavy or unwieldy for a­volation. And to shew, that the fire may effect a laevigation in the surfa­ces of some corpuscles, I have some­times caused Minium, and some o­ther calces, that I judged convenient, to be melted for a competent time, in a vehement fire conveniently ad­ministred; whereby, according to expectation, that which was before a dull and incoherent powder, was reduced into much grosser corpuscles, multitudes of whose grains appea­red smooth, glittering, and almost specular, like those of fine litharge of gold; and the masses that these grains composed, were usually solid enough and of difficult fusion. And when we make glass of Lead per se, (which I elsewhere teach you how to doe,) 'tis plain, that the particles of the Lead are reduced to a great smoothness; since, wheresoever you break the glass, the surfaces, produ­ced at the crack, will not be jagged, but smooth, and considerably specu­lar. [Page 12] Nor do I think it impossible, that, even when the fire does not make any great attrition of the Cor­puscles of the body to be fixt, it may yet occasion their sticking together, because by long tumbling them up and down in various manners, it may at length, after multitudes of revo­lutions and differing occursions, bring those of their surfaces together, which, by reason of their breadth, smoothness, or congruity of figure, are fit for mutual cohesion; and when once they come to stick, there is no necessity, that the same causes, that were able to make them pass by one another, when their contact was but according to an inconsiderable part of their surfaces, should have the same effect now, when their con­tact is full; though perhaps, if the degree of fire were much increased, a more vehement agitation would surmount this cohesion, and dissipate again these clusters of coalescent cor­puscles.

These conjectures will perhaps ap­pear [Page 13] less extravagant, if you consider what happens in the preparation of Quick-silver praecipitated per se. For there, running Mercury, being put into a conveniently shaped Glass, is exposed to a moderate fire for a con­siderable time: (For I have some­times found six or seven weeks to be too short a one.) In this degree of fire the parts are variously tumbled, and made many of them to ascend, till convening into drops on the sides of the glass, their weight carries them down again; but at length, after many mutual occursions, if not also attritions, some of the parts begin to stick together in the form of a red powder, and then more and more Mercurial particles are fastened to it, till at length all, or by much the greater part of the Mercury, is re­duced into the like Praecipitate, which, by this cohesion of the parts, being grown more fixt, will not with the same degree of Heat be made to rise and circulate, as the Mercury would before; and yet, as I ellewhere note, [Page 14] I have found by trial, that, with a greater and competent degree of heat, this Praecipitate per se, would, without the help of any volatilizing additament, be easily reduced into running Mercury again. Chymist's and Physicians, who agree in suppo­sing this Praecipitate to be made with­out any additament, will perchance scarce be able to give a more likely account of the consistency and de­gree of Fixity that is obtained in the Mercury; in which, since no bo­dy is added to it, there appears not to be wrought any but a Mechanical change. And though, I confess, I have not been without suspicions, that in Philosophical strictness this Praecipitate may not be made per se, but that some penetrating igneous particles, especially saline, may have associated themselves with the Mer­curial Corpuscles; yet even upon this supposition it may be said, that these particles contribute to the ef­fect that is produced, but by facilita­ting or procuring, by their oppor­tune [Page 15] Interposition, the mutual Cohe­sion of Corpuscles that would not otherwise stick to one another.

Perhaps it will not be altogether impertinent to add, on this occasion, that, as for the generality of Chymists, as well others as Helmontians, that as­sert the Transmutation of all metalls into Gold by the Philosopher's Stone, me thinks, they may grant it to be pro­bable, that a new and fit Contexture of the parts of a volatile body may, especially by procuring a full contact among them, very much contribute to make it highly fixt. For, to omit what is related by less credible Au­thours, 'tis averred, upon his own trial, by Helmont, who pretended not to the Elixir, that a grain of the pow­der, that was given him, transmuted a pound (if I mis-remember not) of running Mercury; where the pro­portion of the Elixir to the Mercury was so inconsiderable, that it cannot reasonably be supposed, that every Corpuscle of the Quick-silver, that before was volatile, was made ex­treamly [Page 16] fixt meerly by its Coalition with a particle of the powder, since, to make one grain suffice for this Coalition, the parts it must be divi­ded into must be scarce conceivably minute, and therefore each single part not likely to be fixt it self, or at least more likely to be carried up by the vehemently agitated Mercury, than to restrain that from avolation; whereas, if we suppose the Elixir to have made such a commotion among the corpuscles of the Mercury, as (having made them perhaps somewhat change their figure, and expelled some inconvenient particles,) to bring them to stick to one another, according to very great portions of their surfaces, and intangle one another, it will not be disagreeable to the Mechanical Doctrine of Fixity, that the Mercury should endure the fire as well as Gold, on the score of its new Tex­ture, which, supposing the story true, appears to have been introdu­ced, by the new colour, specifick gravity, Indissolubleness in Aqua [Page 17] fortis, and other Qualities wherein Gold differs from Mercury, espe­cially Malleableness, which, accor­ding to our Notes about that Quali­ty, usually requires that the parts, from whose union it results, be ei­ther hooked, branched, or other­wise adapted and fitted to make them take fast hold of one another, or stick close to one another. And since, in the whole mass of the factitious Gold, all save one grain must be ma­terially the same body, which, before the projection was made, was Quick-silver, we may see how great a pro­portion of volatile matter may, by an inconsiderable quantity of fixing additament, acquire such a new Dis­position of its parts, as to become most fixt. And however, this In­stance will agree much better with the Mechanical Doctrine about Fixi­ty, than with that vulgar Opinion of the Chymists, (wherewith 'twill not at all comply,) That if, in a mix­ture, the volatile part do much ex­ceed the fixt, it will carry up that, [Page 18] or at least a good portion thereof, with it; and on the contrary. But though this Rule holds in many cases, where there is no peculiar indispositi­on to the effect that is aimed at; yet if the Mechanical affections of the bodies be ill suited to such a purpose, our Philosophical Experiment mani­festly proves, that the Rule will not hold, since so great a multitude of grains of Mercury, in stead of carry­ing up with them one grain of the Elixir, are detained by it in the stron­gest fire. And thus much for the first way of fixing Volatile Bodies.

CHAP. III.

THE second way of producing Fixity, is by expelling, brea­king, or otherwise disabling those volatile Corpuscles that are too in­disposed to be fixt themselves, or are fitted to carry up with them such par­ticles as would not, without their help, ascend. That the Expulsion [Page 19] of such parts is a proper means to make the aggregate of those that re­main more fixt, I presume you will not put me solicitously to prove; and we have a manifest instance of it in Soot, where, though many active parts were by the violence of the fire and current of the air carried up together by the more volatile parts; yet, when Soot is well distilled in a Retort, a competent time being gi­ven for the extricating and avolation of the other parts, there will at the bottom remain a substance that will not now fly away, as it formerly did. And here let me observe, that the recesse of the fugitive corpuscles may contribute to the fixation of a body, not barely because the remaining matter is freed from so many unfixt, if not also volatilizing, parts; but, as it may often happen, that upon their recesse the pores or intervals, they left behind them, are filled up with more solid or heavy matter, and the body becomes, as more homogeneous, so more close and compact. And [Page 20] whereas I intimated, that, besides the expulsion of unfit corpuscles, they may be otherwise disabled from hindering the fixation of the masse they belong to, I did it, because it seems very possible, that in some ca­ses they may, by the action of the fire, be so broken, as with their frag­ments to fill up the pores or intervals of the body they appertained to; or may make such coalitions with the particles of a convenient additament, as to be no impediment to the Fixity of the whole masse, though they re­main in it. Which possibly you will think may well happen, when you shall have perused the Instances an­next to the fourth way of fixing bo­dies.

The third means of fixing, or lessening the Volatility of, bodies, is by preserving that rest among the parts, whose contrary is necessary to their Volatilization. And this may be done by preventing or checking that Heat, or other motion, which ex­ternal Agents strive to introduce [Page 21] into the parts of the proposed body. But this means tending rather to hin­der the actual avolation of a portion of matter, or, at most, procure a tem­porary abatement of its volatility, than to give it a stable fixity, I shall not any longer insist on it.

The fourth way of producing Fixity in a body, is by putting to it such an appropriated Additament, whether fixt or volatile, that the Corpuscles of the body may be put among themselves, or with those of the additament, into a complicated state, or intangled contexture. This being the usual and principal way of producing Fixity, we shall dwell somewhat the longer upon it, and give Instances of several degrees of Fixation. For, though they do not produce that quality in the strictest acceptation of the word, Fixity; yet 'tis usefull in our present inquiry, to take notice, by what means that volatility comes to be gradually aba­ted, since that may facilitate our understanding, how the Volatility [Page 22] of a body comes to be totally aba­ted, and consequently the body to be fixt.

CHAP. IV.

AND first we find, that a fixt ad­ditament, if its parts be conve­niently shaped, may easily give a degree of fixity to a very volatile body. Thus Spirit of Nitre, that will of it self easily enough fly away in the Air, having its saline particles as­sociated with those of fixt Nitre, or salt of Tartar, will with the Alkaly compose a salt of a Nitrous nature, which will endure to be melted in a Crucible without being deprived even of its Spirits. And I have found, that the spirits of Nitre, that abound in Aqua fortis, being concoagulated with the Silver they corrode, though one would not expect that such sub­tile Corpuscles should stick fast to so compact and solid a body as Silver; yet Crystalls, produced by their [Page 23] Coalition, being put into a Retort, may be kept a pretty while in fusion, before the metal will let go the Ni­trous spirits. When we poured Oil of Vitriol upon the Calx of Vitriol, though many Phlegmatick and o­ther Sulphureous particles were dri­ven away by the excited Heat; yet the saline parts, that combined with the fixt ones of the Colcothar, stuck fast enough to them, not to be easily driven away. And if Oil of Vitriol be in a due proportion dropt upon Salt of Tartar, there results a Tarta­rum vitriolatum, wherein the acid and alkalizate parts cohere so strong­ly, that 'tis not an ordinary degree of fire will be able to disjoyn them. Insomuch that divers Chymists have (though very erroniously) thought this compounded Salt to be indestru­ctible. But a less heavy liquour than the ponderous Oil of Vitriol may by an Alkaly be more strongly detained than that Oil it self; experience ha­ving assured me, that Spirit of Salt being dropt to satiety upon a fixt [Page 24] Alkaly, (I used either that of Nitre or of Tartar,) there would be made so strict an union, that, having, with­out additaments, distilled the resulting salt with a strong and lasting fire, it appeared not at all considerably to be wrought upon, and was not so much as melted.

But 'tis not the bare Mixture or Commistion of Volatile particles with Fixt ones, (yea though the for­mer be predominant in quantity,) that will suffice to elevate the latter. For, unlesse the figures of the latter be congruous and fitted to fasten to the other, the volatile parts will fly away in the Heat, and leave the rest as fixt as before: as when sand or ashes are wetted or drenched with water, they quickly part with that water, without parting with any de­gree of their Fixity. But on the o­ther side, it is not always necessary, that the body, which is fitted to destroy, or much abate, the volati­lity of another substance, should be it self fixt. For, if there be a skilful [Page 25] or lucky coaptation of the figures of the particles of both the bodies, these particles may take such hold of one another, as to compose corpu­scles, that will neither by reason of their strict union be divided by Heat; nor by reason of their resulting gross­ness be elevated even by a strong fire, or at least by such a degree of Heat as would have sufficed to raise more indisposed bodies than either of the separate Ingredients of the mix­ture. This observation, if duly made out, does so much favour our Do­ctrine about the Mechanical Origine of Fixation, and may be of such use, not onely to Chymists, in some of their operations, but to Philosophers, in as­signing the causes of divers Phaenome­na of Nature, that it may be worth while to exemplifie it by some In­stances.

The first whereof I shall take from an usual practice of the Chymists themselves: which I the rather doe, to let you see, that such known Ex­periments are too often over-looked [Page 26] by them that make them, but yet may hint or confirm Theories to those that reflect on them. The In­stance, I here speak of, is that which is afforded by the vulgar Prepara­tion of Bezoardicum Minerale. For, though the rectified Butter or Oil of Antimony and the Spirit of Nitre, that are put together to make this white Praecipitate, are both of them distilled liquours; yet the copious powder, that results from their Union, is, by that Union of volatile parts, so far fixt, that, after they have edulcora­ted it with water, they prescribe the calcining of it in a Crucible for five or six hours: which operation it could not bear, unless it had attained to a considerable fixation. This dis­course supposes with the generality of Chymists, that the addition of a due quantity of spirit of Nitre, is necessary to be employed in making the Bezoardicum Minerale. But if it be a true Observation, which is attri­buted to the Learned Guntherus Bil­lichius, (but which I had no Furnace [Page 27] at hand to examine when I heard of it,) if, I say, it be true, that a Bezo­ardicum Minerale may be obtained, without spirit of Nitre, barely by a slow evaporation, made in a Glasse­dish, of the more fugitive parts of the Oil of Antimony; this Instance will not indeed be proper in this place, but yet will belong to the se­cond of the foregoing ways of intro­ducing Fixity. I proceed now to al­leage other particulars in favour of the above-mentioned Observation.

If you take strong Spirit of Salt, that, when the Glass is unstopt, will smoak of it self in the cold air, and satiate it with the volatile Spirit of Urine, the superfluous moisture be­ing abstracted, you will obtain by this preparation (which, you may remember, I long since communica­ted to you, and divers other Virtusi,) a compounded Salt, scarce, if at all, distinguishable from Sal Armoniac, and which will not, as the Salts it consists of will doe, before their co­alition, easily fly up of it self into the [Page 28] air, but will require a not despicable degree of fire to sublime it.

Of these semivolatile Compositi­ons of Salt I have made, and else­where mentioned, others, which I shall not here repeat, but passe on to other Instances pertinent to our pre­sent design.

I lately mentioned, that the Vola­tility of the spirits of Nitre may be very much abated, by bringing them to coagulate into Crystalls with particles of corroded Silver; but I shall now add, that I guessed, and by trial found, that these Nitrous spi­rits may be made much more fixt by the addition of the Spirit of Salt, which, if it be good, will of it self smoak in the Air. For, having dis­solved a convenient quantity of Cry­stalls of Silver in distilled water, and precipitated them, not with a Solution of Salt, but the Spirit of Salt; the phlegm being abstracted, and some few of the looser saline particles; though the remaining masse were prest with a violent fire that kept [Page 29] the Retort red-hot for a good while; yet the Nitrous and Saline spirits would by no means be driven away from the Silver, but continued in fu­sion with it; and when the masse was taken out, these Spirits did so abound in it, that it had no appearance of a Metal, but looked rather like a thick piece of Horn.

The next Instance I shall name is afforded us by that kind of Turbith, which may be made by Oil of Vitriol, in stead of the Aqua fortis imployed in the common Turpethum Minerale. For, though Oil of Vitriol be a distilled liquour, and Mercury a body volatile enough; yet, when we abstracted four or five parts of Oil of Vitriol from one of Quick-silver, (especial­ly if the operation were repeated,) and then washed off as much as we could of the saline particles of the Oil of Vitriol; yet those that remained adhering to the Mercury made it far more fixt, than either of the liquours had been before, and inabled it even in a Crucible to endure such a degree [Page 30] of fire, before it could be driven a­way, as, I confess, I somewhat won­dered at. The like Turbith may be made with Oil of Sulphur per Campa­nam. But this is nothing to what Helmont tells us of the operation of his Alkahest, where he affirms, that that Menstruum, which is volatile e­nough, being abstracted from running Mercury, not onely coagulates it, but leaves it fixt, so that it will endure the brunt of fires acuated by Bellows, (omnem follium ignem.) If this be certain, it will not be a slender proof, that Fixity may be Mechanically pro­duced; and however, the Argument will be good in reference to the Hel­montian Spagyrists. For if, as one would expect, there do remain some particles of the Menstruum with those of the metal, it will not be de­nied, that two volatile substances may perfectly fix one another. And if, as Helmont seems to think, the Menstruum be totally abstracted, this supposition will the more favour our Doctrine about Fixity; since, if [Page 31] there be no material additament left with the Quick-silver, the Fixation cannot so reasonably be ascribed to any thing, as to some new Mechanical modification, and particularly to some change of Texture introduced into the Mercury it self.

And that you may think this the less improbable, I will now proceed to some Instances, whereof the first shall be this; That, having put a mix­ture made of a certain proportion of two dry, as well as volatile, bodies, (viz. Sal Armoniac, and Flower or very fine powder of Sulphur,) to half its weight of common running Mer­cury, and elevated this mixture three or four times from it, (in a conveni­ently shaped, and not over-wide, glass) the Mercury, that lay in the bottom in the form of a ponderous and some­what purplish powder, was, by this operation, so fixt, that it long endured a strong fire, which at length was made so strong, that it melted the Glass, and kept it melted, without being strong enough to force up the [Page 32] Mercury: which, by some trials, not so proper to be here mentioned, seemed to have its salivating and e­metick powers extraordinarily infrin­ged, and sometimes quite suppressed. But this onely upon the bye. In all the other Instances, (wherewith I shall conclude these Notes,) I shall employ one Menstruum, Oil of Vi­triol, and shew you the efficacy of it in fixing some parts of volatile bo­dies with some parts of it self; by which examples it may appear, that a Volatile body may not onely lessen the volatility of another body, as in the lately mentioned case of our spi­rituous Sal Armoniac; but that two Substances, that apart were volatile, may compose a third, that will not onely be less volatile, but considera­bly (if not altogether) fixt.

We mixed then, by degrees, a­bout equal parts of Oil of Vitriol and Oil of Turpentine: and though each of them single, especially the latter, will ascend with a moderate fire in a Sand-furnace; yet, after the Distil­lation [Page 33] was ended, we had a conside­rable quantity, sometimes (if I mis-remember not) a fifth or sixth part, of a Caput Mortuum black as a Coal, and whereof a great part was of a scarce to be expected fixtness in the fire.

To give a higher proof of the dis­position, that Oil of Vitriol has to let some of its parts grow fixt by combination with those of an excee­ding volatile additament, I mixed this liquour with an equal or double weight of highly rectified Spirit of Wine, and not onely after, but some­times without, previous digestion, I found, that the fluid parts of the mix­ture being totally abstracted, there would remain a pretty quantity of a black Substance so fixt as to afford just cause of wonder.

And because Camphire is esteemed the most fugitive of consistent bo­dies, in regard that, being but laid in the free air, without any help of the fire, it will fly all away; I tried, what Oil of Vitriol abstracted from [Page 34] Camphire would doe; and found at the bottom of the Retort a greater quantity than one would expect of a Substance as black as pitch, and al­most as far from the volatility as from the colour of Camphire, though it appeared not, that any of the Gum had sublim'd into the neck of the Retort.

From all which Instances it seems manifestly enough to follow, that in many cases there needs nothing to make associated particles, whether volatile or not, become fixt, but ei­ther to implicate or intangle them among themselves, or bring them to touch one another according to large portions of their surfaces, or by both these ways conjoyntly, or by some others, to procure the firm Cohae­sion of so many particles, that the re­sulting Corpuscles be too big or hea­vy to be, by the degree of fire wherein they are said to be fixt, dri­ven up into the Air.

CHAP. I.

BY Precipitation is here meant such an agitation or motion of a heterogeneous liquor, as in no long time makes the parts of it subside, and that usually in the form of a powder or other consistent bo­dy.

[Page 2] As, on many occasions, Chymists call the substance that is made to fall to the bottom of the liquor, the Pre­cipitate; so for brevity sake we shall call the body that is put into the li­quor to procure that subsiding, the Precipitant; as also that which is to be struck down, the Precipitable sub­stance or matter, and the liquor where­in it swims before the separation, the Menstruum or Solvent.

When a hasty fall of a heteroge­neous body is procured by a Precipi­tant, the Operation is called Precipi­tation in the proper or strict sense: But when the separation is made without any such addition, or the sub­stance, separated from the fluid part of the liquor, instead of subsiding emerges, then the word is used in a more comprehensive, but less proper, acceptation.

As for the Causes of Precipitation the very name it self in its Chymical sense having been scarce heard of in the Peripatetic Schools, it is not to be expected, that they should have given [Page 3] an account of the Reasons of the thing. And 'tis like, that those few Aristotelians, that have, by their converse with the laborato­ries or writings of Chymists, taken notice of this Operation, would, ac­cording to their custom on such occa­sions, have recourse for the explica­tion of it to some secret sympathy or antipathy between the bodies whose action and reaction intervenes in this Operation.

But if this be the way proposed, of accounting for it, I shall quickly have occasion to say somewhat to it in con­sidering the ways proposed by the Chymists, who were wont to refer Precipitation, either, as is most usual, to a sympathy betwixt the Precipita­ting body and the Menstruum which makes the Solvent run to the embra­ces of the Precipitant, and so let fall the particles of the body sustained before; or (with others) to a great an­tipathy or contrariety between the acid salt of the Menstruum and the fixed salt of the Oil, or solution of [Page 4] calcined Tartar, which is the most general and usual Precipitant they im­ploy.

But I see not, how either of these causes will either reach to all the Phae­nomena that have been exhibited, or give a true account even of some of those, to which it seems applicable. For first, in Precipitations, wherein what they call a sympathy between the liquors, is supposed to produce the effect, this admired sympathy does not (in my apprehension) evince such a mysterious occult Quality as is presumed, but rather consists in a greater congruity as to bigness, shape, motion and pores of the minute parts between the Menstruum and the Preci­pitant, than between the same Solvent and the body it kept before dissolv­ed. And though this sympathy rightly explained may be allowed to have an interest in some such Preci­pitations as let fall the dissolved bo­dy in its pristine nature and form, and only reduced into minute pow­der; yet I find not, that in the gene­rality [Page 5] of Precipitations this Doctrine will hold; For in some that we have made of Gold and Silver in proper Menstruums, after the subsiding mat­ter had been well washed and dried, several Precipitates of Gold made, some with oil of Tartar, which a­bounds with a fixed salt, and is the usual Precipitant, and some with an Urinous Spirit, which works by Ver­tue of a salt highly fugitive or Vo­latile, I found the powder to exceed the weight of the Gold and Silver I had put to dissolve; and the Eye it self sufficiently discovers such Preci­pitates not to be meer metalline pow­ders, but Compositions, whose con­sisting, not (as hath been by some bo­dy suspected) of the combined Salts alone, but of the metalline parts also, may be strongly concluded not only from the ponderousness of di­vers of them in reference to their bulk, but also manifestly from the re­duction of true malleable metals from several of them.

CHAP. II.

THE other Chymical way of ex­plicating Precipitations may, in a right sence, be made use of by a Naturalist on some particular occasi­ons. But I think it much too narrow and defective, as 'tis in a general way proposed, to be fit to be acquiesced in. For first 'tis plain, that 'tis not only Salt of Tartar and other fixed Alcalies that precipitate most bodies that are dissolved in acid Menstru­ums; as in making of Aurum fulminans, oil of Tartar precipitates the Gold out of Aqua Regis: But acid liquors themselves do on many occa­sions no less powerfully precipitate metals and other bodies out of one another. Thus spirit of Salt, (as I have often tried) precipitates Silver out of Aqua fortis: The corrosive Spirit of Nitre copiously precipitates that white powder whereof they make Bezoardicum Minerale: Spirit or [Page 7] oil of Sulphur made by a glass-bell precipitates Corals, Pearls, &c. dis­solved in Spirit of Vinegar, as is known to many Chymists, who now use this Oleum Sulphuris per Campa­nam, to make the Magistery of Pearls, &c. for which vulgar Chy­mists imploy Oleum Tartari per deli­quium.

I have sometimes made a Menstru­um, wherein though there were both Acid and Alcalizate Salts; yet I did not find, that either acid Spirits or oil of Tartar, or even Spirit of Urine would precipitate the dissolved substan­ces.

And I have observed, both that Salts of a contrary nature will precipitate bodies out of the same Menstruum, as not only Salt of Tartar, but Sea-salt being dissolved, will precipitate each other, and each of them apart will precipitate Silver out of Aqua fortis; and that even, where there is a confessed contrariety betwixt two liquors, it may be so ordered, that nei­ther of them shall precipitate what [Page 8] is dissolved by the other; of which I shall have occasion to give ere long a remarkable instance.

But it will best appear, that the abovementioned Theories of the Peripateticks and Chymists are at least insufficient to solve the Phaeno­mena (many of which were probably not known to most of them, and per­haps not weigh'd by any,) if we pro­ceed to observe the Mechanical ways, by which Precipitations may be ac­counted for; whereof I shall at pre­sent propose some Number, and say somewhat of each of them apart; not that I think all of them to be equally important and comprehen­sive, or that I absolutely deny, that any one of them may be reduced to some of the other; but that I think, it may better elucidate the subject, to treat of them severally, when I shall have premised, that I wouldnot thence infer, that though, for the most part, Nature does principally effect Precipitations by one or other of these ways, yet in divers cases she [Page 9] may not imploy two or more of them about performing the operation.

To precipitate the Corpuscles of a metal out of a Menstruum, wherein being once throughly dissolved it would of it self continue in that state, the two general ways that the na­ture of the thing seems to suggest to him that considers it, are, either to add to the weight or bulk of the dis­solved Corpuscles, and thereby ren­der them unfit to accompany the particles of the Menstruum in their motions; or to weaken the sustaining power of the Menstruum, and there­by disable it to keep the metalline particles swimming any longer: which falling of the deserted parts of the metal or other bodie, does often­times the more easily insue, because in many cases, when the sustaining parti­cles of the Menstruum come to be too much weakned, that proves an occasion to the metalline Corpuscles, disturbed in the former motion that kept them separate, to make occur­sions and coalitions among them­selves, [Page 10] and their fall becomes the effect, though not equally so, of both ways of Precipitation; as on the other side, there are several occasi­ons on which the same Precipitant, that brings the swimming particles of the metal to stick to one another, does likewise, by mortifying or disabling the saline Spirits or other parts of the solvent, weaken the sustaining power of that liquor.

CHAP. III.

TO descend now to the distinct Considerations about these two ways: The first of the most genera Causes of Precipitation is such a Co­haesion procured by the Precipitant in the solution, as makes the com­pounded corpuscles, or at least the associated particles of the dissolved body, too heavy to be sustained, or too bulky to be kept in a state of fluidity by the liquor.

[Page 11] That in many Precipitations there is made a coalition betwixt the small parts of the Precipitant and those of the dissolved metal, or other body, and frequently also with the saline spirits of the Menstruum, may be ea­sily shewn by the weight of the Pre­cipitate, which though carefully washed and dryed, often surpasses, and sometimes very considerably, that of your crude metal that was dis­solved; of which we lately gave an instance in Aurum fulminans and pre­cipitated Silver; & we may yet give a more conspicuous one, in that which Chymists call Luna Cornea: For, if having dissolved Silver in good Aqua fortis, you Precipitate it with the solution of Sea-salt in fair water, and from the very white Precipitate wash the loose adhering salts, the remaining powder, being dryed and slowly melted, will look much less like a metalline body than like a piece of horn, whence also it takes its name; so considerable is [Page 12] the additament of the saline to the metalline particles.

And that part of such additaments is, retained, may not only be found by weighing, but in divers cases may be argued from what is obvious to the Eye: as if you dissolve Mer­cury in Aqua fortis, and into the phil­trated solution drop spirit of Salt, or salt-water, or an urinous spirit, as of Sal Armoniac, you will have a very white Precipitate; but if instead of any of these, you drop-in deliquated salt of Tartar, your Precipitate will be of a brick or orange colour. From which experiment and some o­thers I would gladly take a rise to perswade Chymists and Physitians, that 'tis not so indifferent, as those seem to think who look on Precipi­tation butas a kind of Comminution, by what means the precipitation is performed. For by reason of the strict adhesion of divers saline par­ticles of the precipitant and the sol­vent, the precipitated body, not­withstanding all the wonted abluti­ons, [Page 13] may have its qualities much di­versified by those of the particles of the liquors, when these are fitted to stick very fast to it. Which last words I add, because, though that sometimes happens, yet it does not always, there being a geater differ­ence than every body takes notice of between Precipitations; as you will be induced to think, if you pre­cipitate the solution of Silver with Copper, with spirit of Sal Armoniac, with salt water, with oil of Tartar, with quick-silver, with crude Tartar and with Zink. And in the lately proposed Example, you will think it probable, that 'tis not all one, whe­ther to dissolved Mercury or Silver, you imploy the subtile distilled Spi­rits of Salt, or the gross body, whe­ther in a dry form, or barely dissol­ved in common water. And thus much of the Conduciveness of weight to the striking down the Corpuscles of a dissolved Body.

That also the Bulk of a body may very much contribute to make it [Page 14] sink or swim in a liquor, appears by obvious instances. Thus Salt or Sugar, being put into water either in lumps or even in powder that is but gross, falls at first to the bottom, and lies there, notwithstanding the Air that may be intercepted between its parts or externally adhere to it. But when by the infinuating action of the water it is dissolved into minute particles, these are carried up and down with those of the liquor and subside not. The like happens, when a piece of silver is cast into Aqua for­tis, and in many other cases.

On the other side I have several times observed, that some bodies that had long swam in a Menstruum, whilst their minute parts were kept from convening in it, did after­wards by the coalition of many of those particles into bodies of a visi­ble bulk coagulate and subside, (though sometimes, to hinder the evaporation of the Menstruum, the vessels were kept stopt.) Of this I elsewhere mention divers examples; [Page 15] and particularly in urinous and ani­mal spirits, well dephlegm'd, I have found, that after all had for a consi­derable time continued in the form of a perfect liquor, and as to sense homogeneous, store of solid cor­puscles, convening together, setled at the bottom of the glasses in the form of saline Crystals. Having also long kept a very red solution of Sulphur first unlock'd, (as they speak) made with highly rectified spirit of urine, I observed, that at length the Sulphureous particles, making little concretions between themselves, totally subsided and left the liquor almost devoid of tincture. By which you may see, that 'twas not impertinent to mention (as I lately did) among the subordinate causes of Precipitation, the associating of the particles of a dissolved body with one another. Of which I else­where give a notable Example in the shining powder that I obtained from Gold dissolved in a peculiar Menstruum, without any Precipi­tant, [Page 16] by the coalition of the metalline particles, to which a tract of time gave opportunity to meet and adhere in a convenient manner.

If in what the Chymists call Pre­sipitate per se, the Mercury be indeed brought to lose its fluidity, and be­come a powder without being com­pounded with any additional body, (which doubt I elsewhere state and discourse of) it will afford us a no­table instance to prove, that the co­alitions of particles into clusters of the self same matter will render them unfit for the motion requisite to fluidity. For in this odd precipi­tation by fire, wherein the same Menstruum is both the Liquor and the Precipitate, being not all made at once, the Corpuscles that first dis­close themselves by their redness, are rejected by those of the Mercury that yet remains fluid, as unable to accompany them in the motions that belong to Mercury as such.

CHAP. IV.

BEfore I dismiss that way of Preci­pitating, that depends upon the unwieldiness which the Precipitant gives to the body it is to strike down, it may not be impertinent, especially in reference to the foregoing part of this Paper, to consider, that perhaps in divers cases the Corpuscles of a dis­solved body may be made unfit to be any longer sustained in the Menstru­um, though the Precipitant adds very little to their bulk, or at least much more to their specific weight than to it. For I have elsewere shewn, that in divers solutions made of bodys by acid Menstruums, there are either ge­nerated or extricated many small Aerial particles; and it will be easily granted, that these may be small e­nough to be detained in the pores of the liquor and be invisible there, if we consider, what a multitude of aerial and formerly imperceptible bubbles [Page 18] is afforded by common water in our Pneumatical Receivers, when the incumbent air that before pressed the liquor, is pumpt out. And if the Corpuscles of the dissolved body have any little Cavities or pores fit to lodge Aerial particles, or have asperous surfaces, between whose prominent parts the generated air may conve­niently lie; in such cases, I say, these Invisible bubbles may be lookt upon, as making with the solid Corpuscles they adhered to, little aggregates much lighter in specie than the Cor­puscles themselves would be; and consequently if the Precipitant con­sist of particles of such a size and shape as are fit to expel these little bubbles, and lodge themselves in the cavities possessed by them before, there will be produced new aggre­gates composed of the Corpuscles of the dissolved body and the particles of the Precipitant; which aggregates though they do take up very little or perhaps not at all more room (take­ing that word in a popular sense) than [Page 19] those, whereof the Aerial bubbles made a part, will yet be Specifically heavier than the former Aggregates were, and may thereby overcome the sustaining power of the Men­struum.

One thing more may be fit to be taken notice of before we pass on further, namely, that 'tis upon the score of the Specific gravity of a bo­dy, and not barely upon the action of the Precipitant, that an aggregate or a Convention of particles does ra­ther fall to the bottom than rise to the top. For, though the A­gents that procured the Coalition, make the cluster of particles become of a bulk too unwieldy to continue in the liquor as parts of it; yet if each of them be lighter in specie than an equal bulk of the Menstruum, or if they so convene as to intercept a sufficient number of little bubbles or aerial Corpuscles between them, and so become lighter than as much of the Menstruum as they take up the room of, they will not be precipitated [Page 20] but emerge; as may be seen in the Pre­paration of those Magisteries of Ve­getables, I elswhere mention; where some deeply colour'd plants being made to tinge plentifully the Lixivi­um they are boyled in, are afterwards by the addition of Alum made to curdle, as it were, into coloured Con­cretions, which being (totally or in part) too big to swim as they did be­fore they conven'd, and too light in comparison of the Menstruum to sub­fide, emerge to the top and float there. An easier and neater Example to the same purpose I remember I shewed by dissolving Camphire in highly recti­fied spirit of Wine, 'till the solution was very strong. For though the Camphire, when put in Lumps into the spirit, sunk to the bottom of it; yet, when good store of water, (a liquor somewhat heavier in Specie than Camphire,) was poured upon the solution, the Camphire quickly concreted and returned to its own nature, and within a while emerged to the top of the mingled liquors and [Page 21] floated there. These particulars I was willing to mention here, that I might give an instance or two of those pre­cipitations, that I formerly spake of as improperly so called. And here I must not decline taking notice of a Phaenomenon, that sometimes occurs in Precipitations, and at first sight may seem contrary to our Doctrine about them. For now and then it happens, that after some drops of the Precipitant have begun a Precipita­tion at the top or bottom of the Sol­vent, one shakes the vessel, that the Precipitant may be the sooner diffu­sed through the other liquor, but then they are quickly surprized to find, that instead of hastning the com­pleat Precipitation, the matter al­ready precipitated disappears, and the solvent returns to be clear, or, as to sense, as uniform, as it was before the Precipitant was put into it. Bu this Phaenomenon does not at all cross our Theory. For, when this hap­pens, though that part of the Solvent, to which the Precipitant reaches, is [Page 22] disabled for Reasons mentioned in this Discourse to support the dissol­ved body, yet this quantity of the Precipitant is but small in proportion to the whole bulk of the solvent. And therefore, when the agitation of the vessel disperses the clusters of loosly concreted particles through the whole liquor, (which is seldom so exactly proportioned to the body it was to work on, as to be but just strong enough to dissolve it) that greater part of the Liquor, to which before the shaking of the vessel the Precipitant did not reach, may well be lookt upon as a fresh Menstruum, which is able to mortifie or overpow­er the small quantity of the Precipi­tant that is mingled with it, and so to destroy its late operation on the body dissolved, by which means the soluti­on returns, as to sense, to its former state. Which may be illustrated by a not unpleasant Experiment, I re­member I have long since made by precipitating a brick-coloured pow­der out of a strong solution of Subli­mate [Page 23] made in fair water. For this sub­siding matter, being laid to dry in the Philter, by which 'twas separated from the water, would retain a deep but somewhat dirty colour; and if then, putting it into the bottom of a wine glass, I poured upon it, either clear oil of Vitriol, or some other strong acid Menstruum, the Alcali­zat particles being disabled and swal­lowed up by some of the acid ones of the Menstruum, the other acid ones would so readily dissolve the residue of the powder, that in a trice the co­lour of it would disappear and the whole mixture be reduced into a clear Liquor, without any sediment at the bottom.

Thus much may suffice at present about the first general way of Preci­pitating Bodies out of the Liquors they swam in.

CHAP. V.

THE other of the two princi­pal ways, by which Precipita­tions may be effected, is the disabling of the Solvent to sustain the dissolved body.

There may be many instances, wherein this second way of effecting Precipitations may be associated by Nature with the first way formerly proposed; but notwithstanding the cases, wherein Nature may (as I for­merly noted) imploy both the ways therein, yet in most cases they suffici­ently differ, in regard that in the former way the subsiding of the dis­solved body is chiefly, if not only, caused by the additional weight as well as action of the external Preci­pitant; whereas in most of the in­stances of the later way, the effect is produced either without salt of Tar­tar, or any such Precipitant, or by some other quality of the Precipi­tant [Page 25] more than by its weight, or at least besides the weight it adds: Though I forget not, that I lately gave an example of a shining pow­der of Gold, that fell to the bottom of a Menstruum without the help of an External Precipitant: But that was done so slowly, that it may be dis­puted, whether it were a true Preci­pitation; and I alledged it not as such, but to shew, that the increased bulk of Particles may make them un­fit to swim in Menstruums, wherein they swam whilst they were more minute. And the like answer may be accommodated to the Precipitate per se newly mentioned.

This premised, I proceed now to observe, that the general way, I last proposed, contains in it several sub­ordinate wayes, that are more parti­cular; of which I shall now menti­on the chief that occur to me, and though but briefly, illustrate each of them by examples. And first a Pre­cipitation may be made, if the saline or other dissolving particles of the [Page 26] Menstruum are mortified or rendred unfit for their former function, by particles of a Precipitant that are of a contrary nature.

Thus Gold and some other mine­rals, being dissolved in Aqua Regis, will be precipitated with spirit of urine and other such liquors aboun­ding with volatile and salino-sulphu­reous Corpuscles, upon whose ac­count it is that they act; whence these salts themselves, though cast into a Menstruum in a dry form, will serve to make the like Precipitations. And I the rather on this occasion mention Urinous spirits than Salt of Tartar, because those volatile par­ticles add much less of weight to the little Concretions, which compose the Precipitated powder.

Upon instances of this kind, many of the modern Chymists have built that Antipathy betwixt the Salts of the solvent and those of the Menstru­um, to which they ascribe almost all Precipitations. But against this I have represented something already, [Page 27] and shall partly now, and partly in the sequel of this discourse add some farther reasons of my not being satis­fied with this Doctrine. For, be­sides that 'tis insufficient to reach ma­ny of the Phaenomena of Precipitati­ons, (as will ere long be shown,) and besides that 'tis not easie to make out, that there is any real antipathy be­twixt inanimate bodies; I consider, 1. That some of those Menstruums, to which this Antipathy is attribu­ted, do after a short commotion (whereby they are disposed to make convenient occursions and coaliti­ons) amicably unite into concretions participating of both the Ingredi­ents; as I have somewhere shewn by an Example purposely devis'd to make this out; to do which I drop­ped a clear solution of fixed Nitre, instead of the usual one of common salt, upon a solution of silver, in A­qua-fortis: For the saline particles of the Solvent and those of the Preci­pitant, will, as I have elsewhere reci­recited, [Page 28] for the most part friendly unite into such Crystals of Nitre for the main, as they were obtained from: And though this notion of the Chymists, if well explained, be ap­plicable to far more instances than the proposers of it seemed to have thought on, and may be made good use of in Practice; yet I take it to be such as is not true Universally, and, where it is true, ought to be ex­plicated according to Mechanical Principles. For, if the particles of the Menstruum and those of the Precipitant be so framed, that upon the action of the one upon the other, there will be produced Corpuscles too big and unwieldy to continue in the state of fludity, there will insue a Precipitation: But if the constituti­on of the corpuscles of the Precipi­tating and of the Dissolved body be such, that the Precipitant also it self is fit to be a Menstruum to dissolve that body in; then, though there be an union of the Salts of the Precipi­tant [Page 29] and the metal (or other Solu­tum) and perhaps of the solvent too, yet a Precipitation will not necessa­rily follow, though the saline par­ticles of the two liquors seemed, by the heat and ebullition excited be­tween them upon their meeting, to exercise a great and mutual antipa­thy. To satisfie some Ingenious men about this particular, I dissolved Zink or Speltar in a certain urinous spirit; (for, there are more than one that may serve the turn;) and then put to it a convenient quantity of a proper acid spirit; but though there would be a manifest conflict thereby occasioned betwixt the two liquors; yet the speltar remained dissolved in the mixture. And I remember, that for the same purpose I devised another Experiment, which is somewhat more easie and more clear. I dissolved Copper calcined perse, or even crude, in strong spirit of salt; (for unless it be such, it will not be so proper,) and having put to it by degrees a [Page 30] good quantity of spirit of Sal-Armo­niac or fermented Urine, though there would be a great commotion with hissing and bubbles produced, the Copper would not be precipita­ted, because this Urinous spirit will as well as the Salt, (and much more readily) dissolve the same metal, and it would be kept dissolved notwith­standing their operation on one ano­ther; the intervening of which, and their action upon the metalline cor­puscles, may be gathered from hence, that the green solution, made with spirit of salt alone, will by the super­vening urinous spirits be changed either into a blewish green, or, if the proportion of this spirit be very great, into a rich blew almost like ultramarine. And from these two Experiments we may probably argue, that when the Precipitation of a metal &c. insues, it is not barely on the account of the supposed Antipa­thy betwixt the Salts, but because the causes of that seeming Antipathy [Page 31] do likewise upon a Mechanical ac­count dispose the Corpuscles of the confounded liquors so to cohere, as to be too unwieldy for the fluid part.

CHAP. VI.

ANother way, whereby the dis­solving particles of a Menstru­um may be rendred unfit to sustain the dissolved body, is to present them another that they can more easily work on.

A notable Experiment of this you have in the common practice of Re­finers, who, to recover the Silver out of Lace and other such mixtures wherein it abounds, use to dissolve it in Aqua fortis, and then in the solu­tion leave Copper plates for a whole night (or many hours.) But if you have a mind to see the Experiment without waiting so long, you may [Page 32] imploy the way, whereby I have of­ten quickly dispatched it. As soon then as I have dissolved a convenient quantity, which needs not be a great one, of Silver in cleansed Aqua fortis, I add twenty or twenty five times as much of either distilled water or rain water; (for though common water will sometimes do well, yet it sel­dome does so well;) and then into the clear solution I hang by a string a clean piece of Copper, which will be presently covered with little shining plates almost like scales of fish, which one may easily shake off and make room for more. And this may illu­strate what we formerly mentioned about the subsiding of metalline cor­puscles, when they convene in liquors, wherein, whilst they were dispersed in very minute parts, they swam freely. For in this operation the little scales of Silver seemed to be purely metalline, and there is no sa­line Precipitant, as Salt of Tartar or of Urine, imployed to make them [Page 33] subside. Upon the same ground, Gold and Silver dissolved in their proper Menstruums may be precipitated with running Mercury; and if a So­lution of blew Vitriol (such as the Roman, East-Indian, or other of the like colours) be made in water, a clean plate of Steel or Iron being im­mersed in it, will presently be over­laid with a very thin case of Copper­which after a while will grow thick, er; but does not adhere to the iron so loosely as to be shaken off, as the Precipitated silver newly mentio­ned may be from the Copper-plates whereto it adheres. And that in these operations the saline particles may really quit the dissolved body, and work upon the Precipitant, may appear by the lately mentioned practice of Refiners, where the Aqua­fortis, that forsakes the particles of the silver, falls a working upon the copper-plates imployed about the Precipitation, and dissolves so much of them as to acquire the greenish [Page 34] blew colour of a good solution of that metal. And the Copper we can easily again without salts obtain by Precipitation out of that liquor with iron, and that too, remaining dissolved in its place, we can preci­pitate with the tastless powder of another Mineral.

Besides these two ways of weak­ning the Menstruum, namely, by mortifying its saline particles or se­ducing them to work on other bo­dies, and to forsake those they first dissolved, there are some other ways of weakning the Menstruum.

A Third way of effecting this, is by lessening or disturbing the agitati­on of the solvent. And indeed since we find by experience, that some liquors when they are heated, will either dissolve some bodies they would not dissolve at all when they were cold, or dissolve them more powerfully or copiously when hot than cold; 'tis not unreasonable to suppose, that what considerably les­sens [Page 35] that agitation of the parts of the Menstruum that is necessary to the keeping the dissolved body in the state of fluidity, should occasion the falling of it again to the bottom. In slow operations I could give divers examples of the precipitating power of Cold; there being divers soluti­ons and particularly that of Amber-greece, that I had kept fluid all the Summer, which in the Winter would subside. And the like may be some­times observed in far less time in the solutions of Brimstone made in certain oleaginous Menstruums; and I have now & then had some solutions, and particularly one of Benzoin made in spirit of wine, that would sur­prize me with the turbidness (which begins the state of Precipitation) it would acquire upon a sudden change of the weather towards Cold, though it were not in the winter season.

Another way of weakening the Menstruum and so causing the Preci­pitation of a body dissolved in it, is [Page 36] the diluting or lessening the tenaci­ty of it, whether that tenacity pro­ceed from viscosity or the compe­tent number and constipation of the parts.

Of this we have aninstance in the Magisteries (as many Chymists are pleased to call them) of Jalap, Ben­zion, and of divers others, Resi­nous and Gummous bodies dissolved in spirit of wine. For by the affusion of common water, the Menstruum being too much diluted is not able to keep those particles in the state of fluidity, but must suffer them to sub­side, (as they usually do in the form of white powder,) or, (as it may happen sometimes,) make some parts emerge. Examples also of this kind are afforded us by the common pre­parations of Mercurius Vitae. For though in oil of Antimony, made by the Rectification of the butter, the saline particles are so numerous and keep so close to one another, that they are able to sustain the Antimo­nial [Page 37] Corpuscles they carried over with them in Distillation, and keep them together with themselves in the form of a liquor; yet when by the copious affusion of the water, those sustaining particles are separa­ted and removed to a distance from each other, the Antimonial Cor­puscles and the Mercurial (if any such there were,) being of a ponderous nature, will easily subside into that Emetic powder, which, (when well washed) the Chymists flatteringly enough call Mercurius Vitae.

But here I must interpose an ad­vertisement, which will help to shew us, how much Precipitations depend upon the Mechanical contextures of bodies. For, though not only in the newly recited examples, but in divers others, the affusion of water, by diluting the salts and weaken­ning the Menstruum, makes the me­tall or other dissolved body fall pre­cipitately to the bottom; yet if the saline particles of the solvent, and [Page 38] those of the body be fitted for so strict an union, that the Corpuscles resulting from their Coalitions will not so easily be separated by the par­ticles of water, as suffer themselves to be carried up and down with them, whether because of the mi­nuteness of these compounded Cor­puscles, or because of some congrui­ty betwixt them and those of the water; they will not be precipitated out of the weakened solution, but still continue a part of it; as I have tryed partly with some solution of Silver and Gold, made in acid Men­struums, but much more satisfacto­rily in solutions of Copper, made in the urinous spirit of Sal Armoniac. For, though that blew solution were diluted with many thousand times as much distilled water as the dissolved metal weighed; yet its swimming Corpuscles did by their colour mani­festly appear to be dispersed through the whole liquor.

CHAP. VII.

BUT, to prosecute our former discourse, which we broke off after the mention of Mercurius Vitae, 'twill now be seasonable to add, that we have made divers other Precipi­tations, by the bare affusion of wa­ter, out of solutions, and sometimes out of distilled liquors; which, for brevity sake, I here omit, that I may hasten to the last way I shall now stay to mention.

Another way then, whereby Preci­pitations of bodies may be produced by debilitating the Menstruum they swim in, is by lessening the propor­tion of the Solvent to the Solutum, without any evaporation of the li­quor. These last words I add, be­cause that, when there is an obstruction or any other expulsi­on of the Menstruum by heat, if [Page 41] it be total, 'tis called Exsiccation, as when dry salt of Tartar is obtained from the filtrated Lixivium of the calcined Tartar; and though the evaporation be not total, yet the effects of it are not wont to be reckoned amongst Precipitati­ons. And although the way, I am about to propose, if it be attentive­ly considered, has much affinity with the foregoing, and the Phaenomena may perhaps in some sort be reduced to them; yet the instances that I shall name, having not, that I know, been thought of by others, and being such as every one would not deduce from what I have been mentio­ning, I shall add a word of the in­ducements I had to make the try­als, as well as of the success of them.

Considering then, that Water will not dissolve Salts indefinitely, but when it has received its due propor­tion, 'twill then dissolve no more, but, if they be put into it, let them [Page 40] fall to the ground and continue undissolved; and that if when water is satiated, any of the liquor be evaporated or otherwise wasted, it will in proportion let fall the salt it had already taken up; I conclu­ded, that if I could mingle with water any liquor, with which its particles would more readily associ­ate than with those of Salt, the depriving the solution of so many of its aqueous particles would be equivalent to the evaporation of as much water or thereabouts, as they, by being united, could compose. Wherefore making a lixivium of di­stilled water or clean rain-water, and of Salt of Tartar so strong, that if a grain more were cast in it, it would lie undissolved at the bot­tom; I put a quantity of this fiery Lixivium into a slender cylindrical vessel, till it had therein reached such a height as I thought fit; then taking as much as I thought suffi­cient of strong spirit of wine, that [Page 42] would burn every drop away, that so it might have no flegm nor wa­ter of its own, I poured this upon the saline solution, and shaking the liquors pretty well together to bring them to mix as well as I could, I laid the tube in a quiet place, and afterwards found, as I expected, that there was a pretty quantity of white salt of Tartar fallen to the bottom of the vessel, which salt had been meerly forsaken by the aque­ous particles that sustained it be­fore, but forsook it to pass into the spirit of wine, wherewith they were more disposed to associate them­selves; which I concluded, because having, before I poured on this last named liquor, made a mark on the glass to shew how far the lixivium reached, I found (what I looked for) that after the Precipitation, the Lixivium, that remained yet strong enough to continue unmixed with the incumbent spirit, had its surface not where the mark shewed it had [Page 43] been before, but a considerable di­stance beneath it, the spirit of wine having gained in extent what it lost in strength by receiving so many aqueous particles into it. I chose to make this tryal rather with a Lixi­vium of Salt of Tartar than with oyl of Tartar per Deliquium, be­cause in this last named liquor the aqueous and saline particles are more closely combined and there­fore more difficult to be separated than I thought they would be in a Lixivium hastily made, though very strong. And though by much agi­tation I have sometimes obtained some salt of Tartar from the above-mentioned oil; yet the experiment succeeded nothing near so well with that liquor as with a Lixivium.

I made also the like tryal with ex­ceedingly dephlegmed spirit of wine, and as strong a Brine as I could make of common salt dissolved with­out heat in common water; and I thereby obtained no despicable pro­portion of finely figured salt, that [Page 44] was let fall to the bottom. But this experiment, to be succesful, requires greater care in him that makes it, than the former needs.

To confirm, and somewhat to vary this way of Precipitation, I shall add, that having made a clear solution of choice Gum Arabic in common water, and poured upon it a little high rectified spirit of wine, on this occasion there was also made, and that in a trice, a copious precipitation of a light and purely white substance not unpleasant to behold. And for further Confirma­tion I dissolved a full proportion of Myrrhe in fair water, and into the filtrated solution, which was tran­sparent, but of a high brown colour, I dropt a large proportion (which Circumstance is not to be omitted) of carefully dephlegm'd spirit of wine, which according to expecta­tion made a copious Precipitate of the Gum. And these instances I the rather set down in this place, because they seem to show, that [Page 45] simple water is a real Menstruum, which may have its dissolving and sustaining virtue weakened by the accession of Liquors, that are not doubted to be much stronger than it.

By specifying the hitherto menti­oned wayes, whereby Precipitations may be Mechanically performed and accounted for, I would by no means be thought to deny, that there may be some omitted here, which either others that shall consider the matter with more attention, or I my self, if I shall have leisure to do it, may think on. For I propose these but as the chief that occurr to my present thoughts; and I forbear to add more instances to exemplifie them, because I would not injure some of my other papers, that have a greater right to those Instances. Only this I shall note in general, that the Doctrine and History of Preci­pitations, if well delivered, will be a thing of more extent and moment than seems hitherto to have been imagined; since not only several of [Page 46] the changes in the blood and other liquors and juices of the humane body may thereby be the better un­derstood; and they prevented, or their ill consequences remedied; but in the practical part of Minera­logy divers usefull things may pro­bably be performed by the assist­ance of such a Doctrine and Histo­ry. To keep which conjecture from seeming extravagant, I shall only here intimate, that 'tis not a­lone in bodies that are naturally or permanently liquid, but in those solid and ponderous bodies, that are for a short time made so by the violence of the fire, that many of the things suggested by this Do­ctrine may have place. For whilst divers of those Bodies are in fusion, they may be treated as liquors; and metalls, and perhaps other hetero­geneous bodies may be obtained from them by fit though dry Pre­cipitants, as in some other writings I partly did, and may elsewhere yet further, declare.