Page 48 - Treatise on Salt

Now, how must you prepare these two substances?
By the mean of your salt of earth,
I dare not write it openly,
For God will have it concealed;
And one must by no means give to the swine
A viand made of precious pearls.
However, learn from me, with all fidelity,
That no foreign thing must enter into the work;
As ice, by the heat of the fire,
Is converted into its primitive water,
It is necessary also, that the stone
Become a water in itself:
It has need but of a gentle and moderate bath,
In which it dissolves of its own accord,
By the means of putrefaction.
Separate the water therefrom,
And reduce it into a red oil,
Which is that soul of a purple colour.
And when you shall have obtained these two substances,
Bind them gently together,
And put them into the philosophers egg,
Closed hermetically.
And you must place them on an athanor,
Which you must guide according to the exigency, and custom, of all the
sages,
In administering to it a very slow fire,
Such as a hen gives to her eggs to hatch her chickens;
Then the water, by a great effort, will attract to itself all the sulphur,
Insomuch that there will no longer appear anything thereof,
Which however can not last long.
For by its heat and siccity
It will strive to make itself manifest again,
Which on the contrary the cold Luna will endeavour to hinder.
Here will begin a great conflict between these two substances,
During which, the one, and the other will ascend
On high, whether they raise themselves by an admirable mean;
But the wind constrains them to descend downwards,
Notwithstanding which they fly again upwards,
And after they have for a good while continued these motions and
circulations,

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