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How Gold is mortified.
We consider it unnecessary to repeat here the mortification of gold into its arcana—tincture, quintessence, resin, crocus, vitriol, sulphur and other outstanding arcana, for which there are many preparations. We have already sufficiently taught most of them in other books: the extraction of the Sun’s tincture, quintessence, Mercury, oil, potable Sun, resin and crocus, in the Archidoxis and elsewhere. We shall describe here arcana omitted there, such as the Sun’s vitriol and sulphur, which are far from insignificant and ought greatly to delight every physician. To extract vitriol from the Sun, take two or three marks of purified gold, beat them into plates and suspend them above boys’ urine mixed with grape berries in a broad glass cucurbit well sealed above. Bury it in a fermenting heap of grape berries as taken from the press, and leave it there fourteen days or three weeks. Then open it: you will find a very subtle colour, the Sun’s vitriol, adhering to the gold plates. Remove it with a hare’s foot, as you heard for other metals: crocus of Mars from iron plates, vitriol of Venus and verdigris from copper plates, ceruse from lead plates, lazurium from silver plates and so forth. These are embraced by one process, though not by an identical preparation. When you have enough of this Gold vitriol, boil it well in distilled rainwater, continually stirring with a spatula. The sulphur of gold then rises to the water’s surface like oil; remove it with a spoon. Proceed likewise with other vitriol. Once the sulphur has been removed, evaporate the rainwater to dryness: Gold vitriol remains at the bottom and can readily be dissolved by itself on marble in a moist place. A diaphoretic virtue lies hidden in these two arcana, vitriol of gold and sulphur of gold. We do not describe their virtues here, for we have sufficiently indicated them in the book On Metallic Diseases and other books.
How Gold’s sulphur and vitriol are made.
How sulphur is mortified and fixed.
Sulphur is mortified by removing its combustible, stinking fatness and reducing it to a fixed substance. This is done as follows. Take common yellow sulphur reduced to fine powder and draw very acrid aqua fortis from it by distillation three times. Then sweeten the black sulphur remaining at the bottom with fresh water, repeatedly distilling it off until the water leaves entirely sweet and no longer smells of sulphur. Reverberate this sulphur in a closed reverberatory as with Antimony: it will first become white, then yellow, and thirdly red like cinnabar. When it has reached this condition you should rejoice, for it is the beginning of your riches. This reverberated sulphur tinges any Silver very deeply into the most excellent gold and the human body into its highest health, beyond what it is lawful to write: such is the virtue of this reverberated and fixed sulphur.
How salts are mortified.
The mortification of all salts, and whatever is of a salty nature, is the removal and distillation of their wateriness and oiliness, and also of the spirit of salt. When these are removed, they are afterward called dead earth or caput mortuum.
How gems are mortified.
Gems and corals are mortified by being calcined, sublimed and dissolved into liquor, like crystal. Pearls are mortified by being calcined and dissolved in sharp vinegar into the form of milk.
How a magnet is mortified.
A magnet is mortified by being anointed with oil of Mercury or touched by common Mercury: afterward it attracts no iron.