alkahest

Greetings

This is an interesting process from A Compendium of AlchemicalProcesses.

THE PREPARATION OF THE So-CALLEDALKAHEST.Take freshly prepared caustic lime, and, if possible, still hot or warm.Pow-der it quickly in a dry place, and put it into a retort. Add asmuch absolute alcohol as the powder will absorb, and distil the alcoholat a moderate heat, until the powder in the retort is perfectly dry. Thedistilled alcohol is now to be poured again upon the lime, anddistilled, and this operation is to be repeated tentimes.Mix the powder with the fifth part of its weight of pure carbonate ofpotassa. This must ~e done very quickly, and in a dry atmosphere, sothat it may not attract any moisture. Insert this mix-ture of the twopowders in a retort, and heat it gradually, after putting about twoounces of absolute alcohol into the recip-ient. White vapours now arisefrom the powder, and are attracted by the alcohol, and the heating is tobe continued as long as this takes place. Pour the alcohol from thereceiver into a dish, and74 Compendium of A/chemical ?rocesses.

set it on fire. The alcohol burns away and the alkahest remains in thedish. It is an excellent medicine, and is used in the same manner as isthe primum ens melissa.NOTE.On account of the great powers contained in the limestone, Paracelsussays that many a man kicks away with his foot a stone that would be moreValuable to him than his best cow, did he only know what mysteries wereput into it by God, by means of the spirit of Nature.

--regards

ningubal

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To: ningubal, et alFr: Dana

Ningubal wrote: "...> On account of the great powers contained in the

> limestone, Paracelsus> says that many a man kicks away with his foot a> stone that would be more> Valuable to him than his best cow, did he only know> what mysteries were> put into it by God, by means of the spirit of> Nature...."

A latin pun on the word 'calx' is my guess, at P'smeaning.

Yours in the work,D-

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<x-html><!doctype html public "-//w3c//dtd html 4.0 transitional//en"><html> dana wilson wrote:<blockquote TYPE=CITE>To: ningubal, et al Fr: DanaNingubal wrote: "... > On account of the great powers contained in the > limestone, Paracelsus > says that many a man kicks away with his foot a > stone that would be more > Valuable to him than his best cow, did he only know > what mysteries were > put into it by God, by means of the spirit of > Nature. ..."A latin pun on the word 'calx' is my guess, at P's meaning..<a href="http://shopping.yahoo.com/">.</a>.</blockquote>GreetingsThe explanation of the process is fairly straight forward in terms ofboth ingredients, and how to work the process, so I don't see much of aneed to try to guess at what at what Paracelcus was talking about whenhe says, "many a man kicks away with his foot a stone that would be moreValuable to him than his best cow, did he only know what mysteries wereput into it by God, by means of the spirit of Nature". One mightassume that the author saw fit to conclude his explanation of this process

with some words of wisdom in the form of a quote from Paracelcus, so thatfuture alchemists might have something to ponder as they work the process.What I found interesting about this particular process was this statement."It is an excellent medicine, and is used in the same manner as is thepremium ens melissa."What I also found interesting about this particular process, was examiningit in to light of what Rubellus has explained about salt volatilization.I quote, "White vapours now arise from the powder, and are attractedby the alcohol, and the heating is to be continued as long as this takesplace".Regardsningubal </html></x-html>

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