The Secret Work of the Hermetic Philosophy

50Quicksilver is so tainted by original sin that it abounds in a double corruption. The first it contracted from impure earth, which mixed with it in its generation and clung to it through congealing. The other is a fault akin to dropsy, water beneath the skin, proceeding from thick and impure water mixed with the clear water. Nature could not squeeze out and separate it by contraction; because it is foreign, it flees under slight heat. That leprosy afflicting mercury's body is not of its root and substance but accidental, and can therefore be separated from it. The earthy corruption is washed away by a moist bath and nature's washing; the watery corruption is put to flight through a dry bath by the gentle fire of generation. Thus, through a threefold washing and purification, the dragon is renewed, stripped of its old scales and scaly skin.