chapter 16. From this it is evident that the philosophical gold

is not common gold, neither in color nor in substance. For that reason it is said that it bringeth joy to the heart of man, and the same thing holdeth true with silver. But what it extracted from it is a white and a red, a true, constant, and living Tincture. But it is the philosophical gold which one should not buy cheaply, as Alphidius saith. And Morienes saith: Everything bought dearly is deceitful. For with a very small amount of this thing and with little gold we can buy much. But in addition to that, our gold is living gold and our silver living silver, which cannot bring forth anything except life and increase. The common gold and silver are dead, which cannot accomplish anything more than is granted to them by Nature, until they are awakened by a skilled artist from their death, and obtain their life again; then they live also and can prove very effective in the increase and propagation of their kind. Concerning the death of the common metals and the life of our metals, the splendid, still living Philo- sophus Michael Sendivogius, in the 11th Tractate of his book about the Philosopher's Stone, speaketh thus: Thou shouldest be warned not to take common gold and silver, for they are dead: take ours, which are living. And then put them in our fire and a dry moisture will come from them. First dissolve the earth in water, called Mercurius by the Philosophers, and the water will dissolve these Corpora Solis at Lunae, so that only the tenth part remaineth with one part, and this is the deep-rooted moisture of the metals.
Now to speak further about the gold of the Philosophers, it should be known that from the earliest times the Philosophi call their water gold, also sometimes their earth. Of the first Modo the Philosophus Nicarus hath spoken above, and the Rosarius Philosophorum asserts it in the following words: But what say ye to this, that the Philosophi say: Our gold is not a common gold, and our silver is not a common silver? To this I reply that they call water their gold, which riseth to the heights
through the strength of fire; and this gold truly is no common gold. For the common man would not believe that it could rise because of its constancy.
But that the Philosophi also called their earth their gold is likewise attested by Rosarius who saith: Note that the ore is the philosopher's gold. This earth becometh ore, and is called Ferment and Tincture. Therefore saith the author who wrote Clangor Buccinae, in the chapter about the Solution (as also Hermes saith): Sow your gold in the white and leavened earth, which is made fiery, subtle, and airy through Calcination, i.e., Sow so much gold, which is the soul and tingeing power, in the white earth, made white and pure by due preparation, in which is no filth.
From this is revealed that the gold of Nature is not the Materia fermenti, but the tingeing Ferment is the philosopher's gold. And thus it is written in Scala Philosophorum, gradu 7: Their earth wherein their gold is sown is white, and their soul is gold, and the very same Corpus is the place of wisdom, which it assembleth, and is the abode of the Tincture.
And further on the author saith: For that reason Hercules saith: Pour it again, i.e., dissolve the body of Magnesia, which hath become white and like raspberry leaves. For that body seeketh refuge in the best, and the gold extracted from it is called the gold of the philosophers, and is a Tincture, hence is a soul. For with the water the Spiritus riseth into high air, and this white Corpus, when the gold hath become white, they have called our gold after our blackness. Therefore Senior saith: Mix gold with gold, i. e., water with ashes. And Hermes: Sow gold in leavened earth. Therefore the Philosophi write that our gold is no common gold.
To this positive opinion someone might here reply and ask: Why do the philosophers sometimes conceive of their gold as water, but at other times as earth? Doth this not look as if they contradict each other and do not agree about these matters? That they confound these things? Or do they want to mislead their followers? The answer to this is that each and all of the Philosophers, where they have shown the truth, have shrouded it in hidden sayings, and therefore they do not contradict each other, but agree wonderfully with each other, as if speaking with one mouth. They do not create any confusion, and do not seek to mislead the worthy follower, but they present to him truly and clearly, in figurative language, all their secrets before his eyes, but which they conceal and darken before the unworthy and ungodly as much as the Highest God hath given them His mercy, so that such noble pearls will not be cast before swine, which follow only their bodily desires; and thus the Holy Sanc- tuary will not be desecrated. So in respect to the present question the Work proveth itself.
For the good-hearted follower of our art is many times sufficiently instructed, not only as to where our Materia should be obtained, but also that it is a single Materia which, through the skill of the artist, is dissolved into two things, viz., into water and earth, or Mercurium and Sulphur. Now if the Philosophi call the water “gold” or the earth “gold,” they do nothing amiss, for it is a question of their own free will how they shall name it: since they also call their stone their gold, a more than perfect gold, a regenerated gold, and many more names of the kind. But not everyone can understand their meaning, as hath to be accredited to his ignorance rather than to the ill-will of the Philosophers in writing.
And now the art-seeking follower is sufficiently and com- pletely informed of the super-excellent secret of the Materia of our great stone, and that it cannot be taken out of any kind of vegetable growth, or any kind of animal, out of no kind of mineral, and out of no imperfect metal, but it must be extracted from gold and silver, and that our gold and our silver are not the common dead gold and silver, but is that of the Philosophers which is living gold and silver.
Now all that the remaineth to be done is to be instructed about the Solution, the greatest secret of the entire Work.
Now to speak about the Solution: This occureth at once if one maketh something dry moist, softeneth something hard, and revealeth something hidden, i.e., when one transformeth a hard thing into water, but not into common water, as Parmenides and Agadmoe the Philosophi teach in the Turba Philosophorum, where they say: There are some who, when they hear about the dissolving of the bodies, believe it is a water of the clouds. But if they had read and understood our books, they would know that our water is permanent, especially in the water of the Philoso~- phers, ie., in the first Materia, as saith Arnoldus in Rosarium 1,