Essais chimiques d’eckartshausen

On the Possibility of the Existence of Metal Dyes

Proved by reasoning and experiments on the dissociation of Metals

To dye means to transform.

For something to be dyed, something must have been changed.

To do this, therefore, two things must be present: What must be dyed or transformed, what dyes or will transform.

What dyes yes transforms is the Tincture or the Active; what is to be dyed is the Passive or the subject of the dyeing.

Dye [in the alchemical sense: “tingiren”] has some resemblance to the processes of dyeing [in the industrial sense “Färberei”]; coloring is equivalent to changing the orientation of particles in a body relative to light rays. Coloring therefore results from a modification of the shape, and this result is inseparable from a given shape.

Dye (" tingiren ”) therefore simply means changing the shape or direction of the parts to be colored in relation to the luminous force in action21.

What "dyed" must therefore contain a force capable of giving a certain orientation to the elements of the body to be dyed, in order to make them appear in such and such chromatic modality and not in such another.

Each coloring substance capable of dyeing must contain in itself the concentrated coloring force; the more concentrated something, the more powerful is the force of expansion. The closer together the particles of a dyed body are, the greater is the intensity of the color and the more likely this body will be in turn dyeing other bodies in the dissolution.

The strength of the dye is proportional to the degree of condensation; the essence of the dyeing resides in: the state of 'the most intimate union of the parts and the tinctorial form behaves according to the faculty of redilation of these parts.

The formation of a metal is simply a change in the shape of the metal base.

Experience shows that when metals are treated with phosphoric acid they turn into a sticky and resinous substance. They lose their polish and their luster because the metallic sulfur changes into phosphoric acid and, consequently, the metallity is destroyed. The cause of metallity is, therefore, phosphorus or metallic sulfur.

20. 
    The reader will have already noticed the intended simplicity of the expressions used by the author and his disdain for effect sentences.
    

As soon as this metallic sulfur is reconstituted, this sticky and resinous substance becomes metal again.

There is therefore a change of form: the metallic sulfur gives to this base another orientation and the result of this action is the metal.

Whoever can dye or transform a metal into gold must be able to modify the matter of light in such a way that the latter, thanks to the metallic sulfur, is in the closest cohesion with the metallic base.

For this reason, metallic sulfur must necessarily be the dyeing principle, because it is the essence (Wesen) which generates metals.

But metallic sulfur is phosphoric, that is, it contains the substance of light and fire or the substance of earth.

Where the substance of the earth (Erdstoff) is linked as closely as possible to that of the sun or of light, the result, in analysis, is a solar body. Where the substance of the sun is found in the synthesis intimately united with that of the earth, the result is an auric body (Goldkörper).

The sun is blazing phosphorus - gold, concentrated phosphorus.

Experience shows us how golden sulfur or phosphorus alone contains in itself the true dyeing essence.

When, for example, copper filings are melted with phosphorus in a vessel of vital air (Lebensluft), we always find, in the residue, a sometimes very large portion of gold and silver, provided that the melting is done very quickly and that the glass is not deteriorated.

Necessarily, the penetrating force of the phosphoric acid which dissociated the copper brought about this phenomenon: the acid united in the copper with the charcoal or the substance of the light which preserves the phosphorus (which is retained by compacting earth) and transformed part of the metal into gold22.

Gold is the product of the auric base (Goldgrund), an enveloping and coloring earth, analogous to talc, and, finally, phosphorus or metallic sulfur.

The ferment of the auric base is phosphoric acid; this gradually acidifies it. The acidified auric base is the subject, which is simply missing the base of the fire which is in the

20. 
    This recipe, which seems to fall into the category of "individuals", however, in order to succeed, requires an effective knowledge of the "universal". Here if the copper is indeed that of the chemists, the phosphorus is quite different from the body to which we give this name. Alchemists know that copper contains an exuberant dye which lacks only fixity, as Basil Valentin observes in his revelation of the mystery of dyes.
    

carbon, to form with the latter and the phosphoric acid a metallic sulfur. This sulfur forms a perfect metal as soon as it is coated with the talc-like earth.

Thus the dough of the bread is made with flour acidified by the yeast. But this dough is not yet bread; it only contains it in potential to become, just as the acidified metal base is not yet the metal, but it is only the metal in potential.

The acidified metal base still requires fire, as does bread dough to become bread. In its reunion with the metallic ferment by means of the substance of the fire, metallic sulfur is produced, which gives the metallic paste its maturity and forms a real metal in it.

Id seem like nature acts the same in mines. First of all, it forms its coloring earth similar to talc, which it acidifies by its saline and igniferous vapors. These fears are the Bergschwaden (mountain exhalations) 23 and the acidified earth is called metallic Gur.

When it is gradually penetrated by igneous vapors or bad storms (böse Gewitter) from the mountains, it absorbs the carbonic substance and forms with the phosphoric acid which is contained therein metallic sulfur, which forms the various metals according to the time, proportions and place24.