The Seven Follies of Science [2nd ed.]

e root of all evil." Those who have a greed for power, a craving for luxury, or a fever for lust,

t of "The Alchemist," and who can doubt but that such desires and dreams spurred on many, either to engage in an actual search for the

tells us that the art of Alchemy was first taught to mankind by demons, who fell in love with the daughters of me

oul, and a visible but impalpable body, like the image in a looking-glass (to which notion we find several allusions in the evangelists); that they know all things, appeared to men and conversed with them, fell in love with women, had intrigues with them and revealed secrets. From the same

ancient mythology which everywhere teaches that men were taught

avor," and that men at a very early day found out the means of working iron, copper, gold, silver, etc., is evident from the accounts given of Vulcan and Tubalcain, as well as from the remains of old tools and weapons. And that Alchemy, as it is generally understood, is a comparatively modern outgrowth of these two arts, is pretty certain. No mention of the art of converting the baser metals into gold, and no account

, in those days, it was dangerous to expound in plain language. One or two elaborate works and several articles supporting this view have been published, but the common-sense reader who will glance through the immense collection of alchemical

lmont, Basil Valentine, and others, describe very substantial things with a minuteness of detail whi

erratic in its beginnings, and giving rise to strange hopes and still stranger theories, but ever working along the line of discovery and progress. And, although many of the professional chemists or alchemists of the middle ages were undoubted charlatans and quacks, yet did we not have many of the same kind in the

s it happened that the list of so-called planets also numbered exactly seven, it was thought that there must be a connection between the two, and, consequently, i

ar compounds and solar medicines. As might have been expected, silver was assigned to Luna or the moon, and in the modern pharmacop?ia such terms as lunar caustic and lunar salts still have a place. Mercury was, of course, appropriated to the planet of that name. Copper was named after Venus, and cupreous salts were known as venereal salts. Iron, probably from its being the metal chiefly

f Sciences" for 1772, M. Geoffroy gives an account of the various modes in which the frauds of these swindlers were carried on. The following are a few of their tricks: Instead of the mineral substances which they pretended to transmute they put a salt of gold or silver at the bottom of the crucible, the mixture being covered with some powdered crucible and gum water or wax so that it might look like the bottom of the crucible. Another method was to bore a hole in a piece of charcoal, fill the hole with fine filings of gold or silver, stopping it with powered charcoal, mixed with some agglutinant so that the whole might look natural. Then when the charcoal burned away, the silver or gold was found in the bottom of the crucible. Or they soaked charcoal in a solution of

well-known chemists and others of high standing. Perhaps the most famous of these is that given by Helvetius in his "Brief of the Golden Calf; Discovering the Rarest Miracle in Nature; how by the smallest p

ldest give me as many golden ducats as would fill this room; for it would have particular consequences, and if fire could be burned of fire, I would at this instant rather cast it all into the fiercest flames.' He then asked if I had a private chamber whose prospect was from the public street; so I presently conducted him to my best furnished room backwards, which he entered, says Helvetius (in the true spirit of Dutch cleanliness), without wiping his shoes, which were full of snow and dirt. I now expected he would bestow some great secret upon me; but in vain. He asked for a piece of gold, and opening his doublet showed me five pieces of that precious metal which he wore upon a green riband, and which very much excelled mine in flexibility and color, each being the size of a small trencher. I now earnestly again craved a crumb of the stone, and at last, out of his philosophical commiseration, he gave me a morsel as large as a rapeseed; but I said, 'This scanty portion will scarcely transmute four grains of lead.' 'Then,' said he, 'Deliver it me back:' which I did, in hopes of a greater parcel; but he, cutting off half with his nail, said: 'Even this is sufficient for thee.' 'Sir,' said I, with a dejected countenance, 'what means this?' And he said, 'Even that will transmute half an ounce of lead.' So I gave him great thanks, and said I would try it, and reveal it to no one. He then took his leave, and said he would call again next morning at nine. I then confessed, that while the mass of his medicine was in my hand the day before, I had secretly scraped off a bit with my nail, which I

history of Elias the ar

e other narratives of the same kind, it may be well to remember that something over

he authority of M. Gros, a clergyman of Geneva, "of the most unexceptionab

requisite for a particular process which he wanted to perform. M. Gros named a M. Bureau, to whom the Italian immediately repaired. He readily furnished crucibles, pure tin, quicksilver, and the other things required by the Italian. The goldsmith left his workshop, that the Italian might be under the less restraint, leaving M. Gros, with one of his own workmen as an attendant. The Italian put a quantity of tin into one crucible, and a quantity of quicksilver into another. The tin was melted in the fire and the mercury heated. It was then poured into the melted tin, and at the same time a red powder enclosed in wax was projected into the amalgam. An agitation took place and a great deal of smoke was exhaled from the crucible; but this speedily subsided, and the whole being poured out, formed six heavy ingots, having the color of gold. The goldsmith was called in by the Italian and requested to make a rigid examination of the smallest of these ingots. The goldsmith not content with the touch-stone and the application of aquafortis, exposed the metal on the cupel with lea

t "although most of these relations are deceptive and many uncertain, some bear such character and t

that the relators were either dreami

efforts of the older chemists to resolve them into their components, but with the advent of more powerful means of analysis they were shown to be compounds, and it is not impossible that the so-called elements into which they were resolved may themselves be found to be compounds. This has happened in regard to some substances which were at one time announced as elements, and it is

of matter, themselves radioactive and themselves unstable; and that finally elements are produced, which, on account of their non-radioactivity, are as a rule, impossible to recognize, for the

esent state of our knowledge the near prospect of successful transmutation does not seem to be very bright, although we cannot regard it as impossible. In the article from which we have already quoted, Sir William Ramsay, after discussing the bearing of certain experiments in regard to the parting with and absorbing of energy by certain elements, says: "If these hypotheses are just, then the transmutation of the elements no longer appears an idle dr

"quantitative theory" of money as if it were an exposed fallacy. Now the quantitative theory of money rests on one of the most well-grounded and firmly established principles in political economy: the trouble is that the writers in question do not understand it o

quite common and cease to be sought after by mankind. One alchemical writer says: "Would to God that all men might become adepts i

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