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Updated: June 6, 2025
Thus by a subtle and most miraculous kind of alchymy did this Catholic cavalier turn worthless paper into precious gold, and make his late impoverished garrison abound in money!"
He had ever since been wandering and unsettled in his abode; sometimes the resident of populous cities, at other times of absolute solitudes. He had searched libraries, meditated on inscriptions, visited adepts of different countries, and sought to gather and concentrate the rays which had been thrown by various minds upon the secrets of alchymy.
One spirit excelled in philosophy; a second, in alchymy; a third, in astrology; a fourth, in physic; a fifth, in poetry; a sixth, in music; and the seventh, in painting: and whenever Pietro wished for information or instruction in any of these arts, he had only to go to his crystal vase, and liberate the presiding spirit.
This scurvy reward was all that the poor alchymist ever got either for his poetry or his alchymy. He died in a state of extreme poverty, in the eighty-third year of his age. This alchymist has left a more distinguished reputation. The most extraordinary tales were told and believed of his powers. He could turn iron into gold by his mere word.
He afterwards changed his plan, and established himself at Milan, where, for a length of time, he practised alchymy, and some say astrology, with great success. Most writers who believed in the secrets of alchymy, and who have noticed the life of Raymond Lulli, assert, that while in Milan, he received letters from Edward King of England, inviting him to settle in his states.
A master then appeared, who was long looked upon as the father of the science, and whose name is indissolubly connected with it. Of this philosopher, who devoted his life to the study of alchymy, but few particulars are known. He is thought to have lived in the year 730.
Besides this, he wrote several other works upon alchymy, a second answer to Libavius upon the Rosicrucians, and many medical works. He died in London in 1637. After his time there was some diminution of the sect in England. They excited but little attention, and made no effort to bring themselves into notice.
He devoted himself to the study of the mystic sciences of astrology and alchymy. He became irritable, morose, and melancholy even to madness. Foreign ambassadors could not get admission to his presence. His religion, consisting entirely in ecclesiastical rituals and papal dogmas, not in Christian morals, could not dissuade him from the most degrading sensual vice.
He pitied me very much, and advised me, with much warmth and kindness of expression, not to amuse myself any longer with such experiments as these, which were all false and sophistical; but that I should read the good books of the old philosophers, where I might not only find the true matter of the science of alchymy, but learn also the exact order of operations which ought to be followed.
He thought that a preparation of gold would cure all maladies, not only in man, but in the inferior animals and plants. He also imagined that all the metals laboured under disease, with the exception of gold, which was the only one in perfect health. An English translation, by a great enthusiast in alchymy, one Richard Russell, was published in London in 1686.
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