From the book
The Golden Chain of Homer
Anonymous (traditionally attributed to Anton Joseph Kirchweger) · Diotimos Editions · 2026
Browse this book’s lexicon →Orientation
At a Glance
- The wordAcid names sourness and a middle degree between the volatile and the fixed.
- In the Golden ChainIt mediates conjunction and becomes either more volatile or more alkaline.
- TranslationThe English retains “acid,” with “sour” for the perceptible quality.
- A place to readB1C20S001: the explicit definition and its mediating function.
Meaning
Acid in this work is both an experienced quality and a position in a transformative order. Its sourness makes it perceptible, but its philosophical importance is that it stands between the supremely volatile and the fixed alkali. It is accordingly called a middle nature and a hermaphrodite. These descriptions are functional: acid can associate with either neighbour and make a conjunction possible that the two extremes cannot achieve directly (B1C19S001; B1C20S001).
The term does not identify a modern class by composition or a measured scale of acidity. The author classifies substances by their behaviour in dissolution, distillation, coagulation, and fixation. Nitre serves as the acid among universal subjects; vinegar as an important vegetable acid. In the mineral kingdom even substances called spirit and oil can both belong to the acidic degree (B1C20S001–004).
Use in the book
The first account of Chaos already includes acid within a threefold division: volatile, acid, and alkali; spirit, soul, and body. This overlays the four elements rather than replacing them with three unrelated substances. Later the same matter receives different names according to its present condition. Acid is therefore one manifestation of the world-spirit becoming bodily, rather than an independent original creation (B1C03S001; B1C17S004).
The long nineteenth chapter explains change through competing proportions and powers. Acid attracts the volatile and assimilates it; earth takes up acid and makes it more fixed. When earth predominates, volatile matter passes through the acid degree toward alkali and stone. With sufficient volatile matter the movement reverses. The account makes acid an active mediator, but also something acted upon. The metaphors of magnetic attraction and eating oneself to death describe reciprocal alteration rather than a permanently unchanged solvent (B1C19S003–005).
The apparent contradiction between a contracting acid and an acid that volatilizes receives an explicit answer. A little acid with abundant earth produces binding and astringent bodies; greater supplies can produce more fusible or volatile ones. The author makes quantity, degree of heat, and fixation decisive. His medicinal conclusion also prefers a middle condition rather than either extreme: a preparation should have the mobility of an acid degree while becoming sweet through the prescribed historical transformation. This is his therapeutic theory, not a modern recommendation (B1C23S045–046; B2C10S024).
Places to read
- Book I · Ch. 19 · §1Acid as intermediary, hermaphrodite, and chymical tongs.
- Book I · Ch. 19 · §3The volatile becomes acid, and acid becomes bodily through earth.
- Book I · Ch. 20 · §1Acid as the middle principle in analysis and conjunction.
- Book I · Ch. 23 · §45Why acid can both constrict and promote volatility.
Translation in this edition
The Latin acidum and German sauer connect a technical designation to sourness of taste or smell. Yet the edition also records acids that have become sweet or fixed. Readers should therefore retain the distinction between an origin or operative degree and a present sensory quality. The phrase “acid corporeal spirit of the world” on the preliminary diagram marks a stage of embodiment, while the later discussions differentiate universal, animal, vegetable, and mineral acids (PRE00S003; B1C20S002–004).