Essais chimiques d’eckartshausen

Abstractions

This experience taught me that gold differs from silver simply in that, in the first case, the substance of fire exceeds in weight that of light.

Silver differs from gold in that the substance of light exceeds in weight the substance of fire. Gold is therefore of a masculine nature and silver of a feminine nature.

On Dissolutions

No dissolution can succeed unless the body to be dissolved is dissociated from the foreign parts associated with it.

The chemical dissolution must, first of all, be facilitated as best as possible by mechanical partitioning. This is achieved by the finest division, the pounding of the parts, in order to give the chemical solution as much surface area as possible.

In metals, it is the alloy of phosphorus or metallic sulfur, which is retained by an earth similar to talc. This compacted earth united to the metal base must therefore be saturated with phosphoric acid.

By its nature, phosphorus has more affinity with phosphoric acid than with the metal that encloses it. The metallic sulfur is therefore divided; phosphoric acid, as a means of dissolution, seeks to penetrate it.

The solution of metals in phosphoric acid is a destruction of metallic sulfur by acid saturation, because oxygen (Sauerstoff) unites with the igneous principle contained in dilute phosphorus and forms phosphoric acid: metallic sulfur is released from the enveloping earth, and the metal separated into its components.

It would certainly be good to know, at each dissolution, the exact proportions of the component parts of the body to be dissolved, for example, in the metal, the part to be dissolved being metallic sulfur, it would therefore be necessary to recognize the proportion of sulfur contained in this metal. It is then that one could determine with precision the true proportion of solvent to be employed.

3. 
   It is about a coal ... a little particular, I said it, and that one would hardly find in the
   

"Bougnats". For example, it could be a metallic substance, saline or metallogenic, depending on the period of the work envisaged or mercurosulfurous in the hermetic sense of these two terms, when the

"White phosphorus" acts on it through heat and a certain humidity.

I will not cross certain limits, but, to put MM. chemists or hyper chemists at their ease and to avoid them wasting time and "fallacious control experiments", I would point out to them that the author treats his "carbon" with the "white" of his phosphorus but not with the red , which is understandable, if one accepts with me that this "red" is still at this stage only a virtual coloring.

The certain rule always remains that the weight of the part to be dissolved calls for a triple weight of solvent. According to this rule, one should use for one ounce of silver lime eight ounces of acid. In such operations, there is never too much solvent: it is from too little that the damage comes¹⁵.

But to find a certain law and surely specify the quantity of solvent, I set to work as follows:

As experience showed me that the portion to be dissolved in metals is metallic sulfur, I could rationally conclude that the whole process of dissolution resided in the transformation of phosphorus or metallic sulfur into phosphoric acid. After repeated experiments, it was confirmed that a grain of phosphorus gave two grains of acid; consequently, I thought, one could, from the sum of the weights, specify a certain portion of metallic lime; in other words, how much metallic lime contained in the metal, and, according to this calculation, it would be possible once and for all to cover the metal to be dissolved with three parts of solvent.

Metallic lime results from the destruction of metallic sulfur.

It is a metal from which its sulfur has been removed, or rather a metal base supersaturated with acid, because the metallicity of its state depends only on sulfur. The metallic sulfur is destroyed when the oxygen unites with the fuel, that is to say with the material of fire which is in this metal and produces with it phosphoric acid.

Therefore, where metallic lime occurs there is lack of metallic sulfur-phosphorus. This reappears again, as soon as the acid can unite with the base of the carbon to form metallic sulfur.
EXPERIENCE

A certain quantity of metallic lime is simply reduced over the fire; there is a loss in weight of the reduced metal, because on calcification part of the phosphoric acid has volatilized. As the amount of acid disappeared with the substance of the fire cannot supply the sufficient amount of metallic sulfur, there necessarily follows a loss of metal.

But if we add certain plants, such as watercress, mustard, etc., while reducing the acid, the weight is completely restored. We can thus be convinced that the phosphoric acid given off by these ingredients unites with the base of the fire to restore the phosphorus or metallic sulfur.

3. 
   This whole chapter on dissolutions is of extreme importance. Keep the proportions and remember about the charitable advice: "It is from too little that the damage comes. The process referred to will find its application - unlike the weights - both at the beginning and in the middle of the work, both in dry & wet paths, by adapting. Do not forget that the philosophers distinguish several Mercury as he distinguishes several Fires. D'Eckartshausen often plays on this terminological keyboard.
   

I also observed during this experiment and while preparing the metallic lime, which one can produce, of real metal only insofar as the enveloping earth or metallic base is in a state of incorporating the metallic sulfur. Only a certain quantity of metallic earth limits a certain portion of metallic sulfur and the metal is composed according to the modes of this limitation, which depend on the purity of the enveloping earth.

To calcine a metal means to steal its sulfur from it; to reduce a metal is to give it back its sulfur,

Calcification occurs when a larger portion of oxygen combines with the base of the fire substance and generates phosphorus.

-Reduction occurs when a larger portion of the substance of the fire converts phosphoric acid into phosphorus and the oxygen volatilizes¹⁶.

It therefore seems to us that, by observing metallic lime¹⁷, nature leads us to that of its own generation of metals. It seems that she first chooses metallic earths and supersaturated them with acid to form metallic salts. The result is a kind of metallic lime or an acid supersaturated metallic base, which lacks only metallic sulfur to become a complete metal.

The binding parts or: the metallic base are then the coloring earth and that which is analogous to talc; they can therefore, analogically, be compared to flour at the baker.

Phosphoric acid would be the ferment by which this metallic base would have to be, little by little, acidified in order to qualify itself progressively as a "metallic subject." Likewise, the flour base must qualify as a “bread subject”.

After complete acidification, nothing is missing if not -baking in the oven. This should be accomplished by the substance of the fire, by means of which the metallic ferment unites with the base to produce the adequate metal.

Another beautiful experience shows us the correctness of this very interesting process of nature.

If we calcine human blood¹⁸ and sprinkle it with charcoal dust, we very quickly obtain a kind of clinker.

The question then arises: How was this clinker formed?

3. 
   P 31. The Igneous base is latent sulfur. This takes hold of the mercury liberated by the departure of oxygen and fixes it in its own nature, or, if you will, "suffers from phosphorus." "
   
4. 
   That is to say a metallogenic Gur. See also the beginning of the chapter on analysis and synthesis of metals.
   

In the operations which are described here, we can understand "phosphoric acid" under two meanings, either universal mercury (or that aspect of mercury that some people call astral quintessence), or philosophical mercury, which has the most common relation to it. narrower and more legitimate. We must distinguish between what mercury is in nature and what can be or become in the laboratory.

3. 
   Chemically
   

We know that the blood contains phosphoric acid; we also find there the substratum of the metallic base or the cobalt earth which, in combination with phosphoric acid, produces the beautiful blue color which is observed in the lye of the blood.

We therefore have two substrates in the blood: phosphoric acid¹⁹ or metallic ferment and cobalt earth or metallic earth. Nothing is missing here except the substance of the fire. This is taken from charcoal and forms with phosphoric acid a real metallic sulfur, contained in the cobalt earth contained in the blood and which forms a metallic slag.

It seems to me that we have here, on a small scale, a process of metallic genesis²⁰.