17 - Thieving magpies: the subtle art of false projecting

Summary

Subtle, an alchemist, outlines how base metals can turn to gold

‘It is, of the one part,

A humid exhalation, which we call

Materia liquida, or the unctuous water;

On th'other part, a certain crass, and viscous

Portion of earth; both which, concorporate,

Do make the elementary matter of gold:

Which is not, yet, propria material,

…

Where it retains more of the humid fatness,

It turns to sulphur, or to quicksilver:

Who are the parents of all other metals.

Nor can this remote matter, suddenly,

Progress so from extreme, unto extreme,

As to grow gold, and leap o'er all the means.

Nature doth, first, beget th'imperfect; then

Proceeds she to the perfect. Of that airy,

And oily water, mercury is engendered;

Sulphur o' the fat, and earthy part: the one

(Which is the last) supplying the place of male,

The other of the female, in all metals.

Some do believe hermaphrodeity,

That both do act, and suffer. But, these two

Make the rest ductile, malleable, extensive.

And even in gold, they are; for we do find

Seeds of them, by our fire, and gold in them:

And can produce the species of each metal

More perfect thence, than nature doth in earth.

Beside, who doth not see, in daily practice,

Art can beget bees, hornets, beetles, wasps,

Out of the carcasses, and dung of creatures:

Yea, scorpions, of an herb, being rightly placed:

And these are living creatures, far more perfect,

And excellent than metals.’

Ben Jonson, The Alchemist, Act 2 scene 3.