friendly reader,

i

wrote the twelve foregoing treatises in love to the sonnes of art, that before they set their hand to the worke they may know the operation of nature, viz. how she produceth things by her working; lest they should attempt to enter in at the gate without keyes, or to draw water in a sieve: for he laboureth in vain, that putteth forth his hands to labour without the knowledge of nature, in this sacred and most true art, he lies in nocturnal darknesse to whom the sun doth not shine, and he is in thick darknesse, to whom after it is night the moon doth not appeare. nature hath her proper light, which is not obvious to our eyes; the shadow of nature is a body before our eyes: but if the light of nature doth enlighten any one, presently the cloud is taken away from before his eyes, and without any let he can behold the point of our loadstone, answering to each center of the beams, viz. of the sun and earth: for so far[pg 40]re doth the light of nature penetrate, and discovers inward things; of which thing take this for an example. let a boy that is twelve yeares old, and a girle of the same age, be cloathed with garments of the same fashion, and be set one by the other, no body can know which is the male, or which is the female; our eyes cannot penetrate so far, therefore our sight deceiveth us, and takes false things for true: but when their garments are taken off, and they are naked, that so it may appear what nature made them, they are easily distinguished by their sexes. just after the same manner doth our intellect make a shadow of the shadow of nature; for the naked body of man is the shadow of the seed of nature: as therefore mans body is covered with a garment, so also mans nature is covered with the body, which god reserves to himself to cover, or uncover. i could here discourse largely, and philosophically of the dignity of man, his creation and generation: but seeing they are impertinent to this place, i will passe them over in silence; only i will treat a little concerning the life of man. man was created of the earth, and lives by vertue of the aire; for there is in the aire a secret food of life, which in the night wee call dew; and in the day rarified water, whose invisible, congealed spirit is better then the whole earth. o holy, and wonderfull nature, who dost not suffer the sons of wisdome to erre, as thou dost manifest in the life of man daily! moreover in these twelve treatises i have produced so many naturall reasons, that he which is desirous of the art, and feares god, may the more easily understand all things, which through gods blessing, with my[pg 41] eyes i have seen, with mine own hands have made without any deceit of sophistication: for without the light, and knowledge of nature, it is impossible to attain to this art, unlesse it come to any by gods speciall revelation, or some speciall friend doth privately shew it. it is a thing of little account, yet most pretious, which being divers times described, i doe now again repeat. take 10 parts of aire, 1 part of living gold, or living silver; put all these into thy vessel; boyle this aire first untill it be water, and then no water. if thou art ignorant of this, and knowst not how to boyl aire, without all doubt thou shalt erre; seeing this is the matter of the ancient philosophers. for thou must take that, which is, and is not seen, untill it be the artificers pleasure; it is the water of our dew, out of which is extracted the salt petre of philosophers, by which all things grow, and are nourished: the matrix of it is the center of the sun, and moon, both celestiall, and terrestiall: and to speak more plainly, it is our loadstone, which in the foregoing treatises i called chalybs, or steel: the aire generates this loadstone, and the loadstone generates, or makes our air to appear, and come forth. i have here entirely shewed thee the truth; begge of god that hee would prosper thine undertakings: and so in this place thou shalt have the true, and right explication of hermes, when he saith, that the father of it is the sun, and its mother the moon, and that which the wind carryed in its belly, viz. sal alkali, which the philosophers have called sal armoniacum, and vegetable, hid in the belly of the magnesia. the operation of it is this, to dissolve the congealed aire, in which thou shall dissolve[pg 42] the tenth part of gold; seale this up, and work with our fire, untill the air be turned into powders; and there appear (the salt of the world being first had) divers colours. i would have set down the whole processe in these treatises; but because that, together with the multiplication, is sufficiently set down in the books of lullius, and other old philosophers; it therefore sufficed me to treat only of the first, and second matter; which is done faithfully, neither do thou ever think that any man living hath done it more cleerly, then i have done it; since i have done it not out of many books but by the labour of my hands, and mine own experience. if therefore thou dost not understand, or beleeve the truth, doe not blame me, but thy self; and perswade thy selfe that god was unwilling to reveal this secret to thee: be therefore earnest with him by prayer, and with serious meditation read over this book oftentimes, especially the epilogue of these twelve treatises: alwaies considering the possibility of nature, and the actions of the elements, and which of them is the chiefest in those actions, and especially in the rarefaction of water, or aire, for so the heavens are created, as also the whole world. this i was willing to signifie to thee, as a father to his son. doe not wonder that i have wrote so many treatises, for i did not make them for my own sake, seeing i lack not books, but that i might advertise many, that work in fruitlesse things, that they should not spend their costs in vain. all things indeed might have been comprehended in few lines, yea in few words: but i was willing to guide thee to the knowledge of nature by reasons, and examples; that thou mightest in the[pg 43] first place know, what the thing is thou seekest after, whether the first, or second matter, also that thou mightest have nature, her light, & shadow discovered to thee. be not displeased if thou meetest sometimes with contradictions in my treatises, it being the custome of philosophers to use them; thou hast need of them, if thou understandest them, thou shall not find a rose without prickles. weigh diligently what i have said before, viz. how four elements distill into the center of the earth a radicall moisture, and how the centrall sun of the earth, by its motion bringeth it forth, and sublimeth it to the superficies of the earth. i have said also that the celestiall sun hath a correspondency with the centrall sun: for the celestiall sun, and the moon have a peculiar power, and vertue of distilling into the earth by vertue of their beams: for heat is easily joined to heat, and salt to salt. and as the centrall sun hath its sea, and crude water, that is perceptible; so the celestiall sun hath its sea, and subtill water that is not perceptible. in the superficies the beams of the one, are joined to the beams of the other, and produce flowers, and all things. therefore when there is raine made, it receives from the aire that power of life, and joins it with the salt-nitre of the earth (because the salt-nitre of the earth is like calcined tartar, drawing to it self by reason of its drynesse the aire, which in it is resolved into water: such attractive power hath the salt-nitre of the earth, which also was aire, and is joined to the fatnesse of the earth) and by how much the more abundantly the beams of the sun beat upon it, the greater quantity of salt-nitre is made, and by consequence the greater plenty of[pg 44] corn grows, and is increased, and this is done daily. thus much i thought good to signifie to the ignorant of the correspondency, or agreement of things amongst themselves, and the efficacy of the sun, and moon, and stars; for the wise need not this instruction. our subject is presented to the eyes of the whole world, and it is not known. o our heaven! o our water! o our mercury! o our salt-nitre abiding in the sea of the world! o our vegetable! o our sulphur fixed, and volatill! o our caput mortuum, or dead head, or feces of our sea! our water that wets not our hands, without which no mortall can live, and without which nothing grows, or is generated in the whole world! and these are the epithites of hermes his bird, which never is at rest. it is of very small account, yet no body can bee without it: and so thou hast a thing discovered to thee more pretious then the whole world, which i plainly tell thee is nothing else but our sea water, which is congealed in silver, and gold, and extracted out of gold, and silver by the help of our chalybs, by the art of philosophers in a wonderfull manner, by a prudent son of art. it was not my purpose for some reasons before mentioned in the preface, to publish this book, but a desire to deserve well of those that are studiously given to liberall, and philosophical arts, prevailed with me, that i might hold forth to them, that i bear an honest mind; also that i might declare my self to them, that understand the art, to be their equal and fellow, and to have attained their knowledge. i doubt not but many men of good consciences, and affections do enjoy this gift of god secretly; these being warned by my example,[pg 45] and dangers are made more cautious, and wise, having that commendable silence of harpocrates. for as often as i would discover my selfe to great men, it alwaies turned to my losse and danger. by this my writing i make my self known to the adopted sons of hermes, i instruct the ignorant, and them that are misled, and bring them back into the right way. and let the heirs of wisdome know, that they shall never have a better way, then that, which is here demonstrated to them; for i have spoken all things cleerly: only i have not so cleerly shewed the extraction of our salt armoniacke, or the mercury of philosophers, out of our sea water, and the use thereof, because i had from the master of nature no leave to speake any further, and this only god must reveale, who knows the hearts, and minds of men. he will haply upon thy constant, and earnest prayers, and the frequent reading over of this booke, open the eyes of thy understanding. the vessell, as i said before, is but one from the beginning to the end, or at most two are sufficient: the fire is continuall in both operations; for the sake of which let the ignorant read the tenth, and eleventh treatise. if thou shalt operate in a third matter, thou shalt effect nothing: they medle with this, whoever work not in our salt, which is mercury, but in herbs, animals, stones, and all minerals, excepting our gold, and silver covered over with the sphere of saturne. and whosoever desires to attaine to his desired end, let him understand the conversion of the elements to make light things heavy, and to make spirits no spirits; then hee shall not worke in a strange thing. the fire is the[pg 46] rule, whatsoever is done, is done by fire; as sufficiently before, so here we have spoken enough by way of conclusion. farewell friendly reader! and long maist thou enjoy these labours of mine, (made good, or verified by mine owne experience,) to the glory of god, the welfare of thine owne soule, and good of thy neighbour.