A compendious body of chymistry, which will serve as a guide and introduction both for understanding the authors which have treated of the theory of this science in general: and for making the way plain and easie to perform, according to art and method, all operations, which teach the practise of this art, upon animals, vegetables, and minerals, without losing any of the essential vertues contained in them. By N. le Fèbure apothecary in ordinary, and chymical distiller to the King of France, and at present to his Majesty of Great-Britain.

CHAP. I. Of such Observations as are necessary for Separating and Purifying the first Five Substances, after they are drawn from the Mixts.

FIRE is a potent agent, and an equivocal cause, which easily drives upwards, evaporable, sublimeable, and volatile Substances, such as are Phlegm, Spirit and Oyl. Phlegm, or the waterish part, because it sticks not very much to the other Principles, doth ascend the first; and for this reason, there is but need of a slow fire to extract it, whereas for the Oyl a stronger is required, by reason of its clamminess and viscosity, and its uni∣on with the Salt; and for the Spirit, it requires yet a more vio∣lent

fire, by reason of its waight, Spirits being nothing else but open Salts, as Salts exchangeably nothing but closed and com∣pacted Spirits. Sometimes the Phlegm, Oyl, and Spirit, do confu∣sedly ascend with much Salt, by the great violence and vehemency of Fire, and some time much of the Earth is also sublimated with these Substances; as it may evidently appear in the Soot of Chim∣neys, from which the separation of the five Substances may easi∣ly be made.

The Phlegm then, which is the first ascending, may be separated with the heat of a luke-warm Bath, or some other analogal heat; it may be severed from the Oyl, by the Funnel, because it swims a∣bove: but from the Spirit it must be separated by the heat of Balne∣um maris, or some such like: for, that heat is capable to elevate the Phlegm, but cannot drive upwards the Spirit by reason of its waight; to that sublimation a stronger fire is required, as that of ashes, sand, or filings, or some quicker heat, according to the nature of the Spirit.

The Salt and Earth are not very strictly united, wherefore they may easily be separated by the help of some aqueous liquor, which is the fittest Menstruum to dissolve Salts, and separate them from the Earth: and as the Earth by its nature is indissoluble, it precipitates it self into the bottom by its own weight: The Salt being thus separated, the Lye must be filtrated, and the Men∣struum evaporated in Glassen Vessels, White-Earth, or Jugge∣metal till it skins, then expose them to the cold to make it shute into Crystals, and so inclose it in Glassen Vessels well stopt, to hinder their melting, by the attraction of the moisture of the Air.

But you are to note, that the fiery, or hot Spirits, drawn from fermented Substances, are lighter yet then the Phlegm, and so ascend the first in their distillation or rectification. A very fa∣miliar and remarkable example is obvious in the making of Wine: for, if you take it to distil in the Must before it hath fermented, nothing but Phlegm will ascend, and the Spirit shall remain, joyned and incorporated with the essential salt of liquor, which shal thick∣en into an extract very sweet and pleasant: But, if you stay your Distillation after the Fermentation is perfected in the Cellar, you shall draw first the hot burning Spirit, which the Phlegm shall fol∣low,

and in the bottom nothing shall remain, but an ungrateful and unsavoury extract, because the essential Salt of the Must, hath been volatilized into Spirit by the action of the fermentation.

The difference of Vessels and several degrees of Fire, are also very useful to separate and joyn again these several substances, af∣ter they have separated assunder: for the bond of their union being once broken, each takes its place by it self; but the fire intervening, reduces all into vapours and exhalations, which ac∣cording to the diversity of Substances are received by the Artist in several Vessels. Thus is the Spirit easily separated from the the Oyl by the funnel, whether it swims on the top, as the Oyls of Flowers and Seeds are used to do; or whether it sinks in the bot∣tom, as doth the Oyl extracted from aromatick Substances and Woods, But nothing but a great and violent heat can separate the Salt from the Spirit, by reason of the great sympathy they have together; when it is noted, that Salts must be made use of in the fixing of Spirits, and Spirits reciprocally to volatilize Salts.

From what we have already said above, every one may of himself make several fine reflections and considerations, touch∣ing the distillation of Mixts abounding in Salt, Spirit, or Oyl, or any other mediane Substance between these three. But it must be noted, in general, that Animals and their parts require in the operations made upon them, only a very slow heat, because they are compounded of a very Volatile Oyl and Spirit; and that Vegetables and their parts need a heat of a more exalted degree, according to their more or less affixation; but Minerals, and chiefly all the family of Salts, require the greatest and intensest hear.

When the Oyls and Spirits ascend with the other Substances confusedly together, they must be rectified, that is to say, puri∣fied by a re-iterated distillation. But a slow and gentle fire draws easily away, and separates asunder the Phlegm and the Salt: the Salt hides himself in the bosom of the Earth, and forsakes it not till the Spirit and Oyl be separated by augmentation of fire, which by the violence of its action disunites finally the compound, and that done, there must be water poured upon the Earth (common∣ly and improperly enough called the Caput mortuum) to dissolve

and separate the Salt: which done, you are to evaporate the Men∣struum, & in the bottom of the Vessel, you shall find are transparent and Crystalline Salt, if the Salt be an Essential Salt which follow∣eth stil the nature of niter, provided you leave a portion of Phlegm, that the Crystals may shoot therein: but, if the Salt be an Alkali made by Calcination, you must evaporate Phlegm dry, and you shall find the Salt in the bottom in the form of an opacous and friable stone.

All these Observations are very necessary to be noted in the practical part, because oftentimes the Artist hath need but of one of these Substances separated from the others: therefore he must be skilful in separating the one from the other according to his pre∣sent occasion, because the desired and lookt for operation is often missed, and impedited by a connexion of the associated principles, when they are yet joyned one to another: for one part of the Mixt may be astringent and coagulating, when the other shall be incisive and astringent, according to the variety of principles that compound the same: and these parts so joyned together, are hurtful, and contrary one to the other, so that when you intend to dissolve, you must know, and be capable to separate the dis∣solving principle by it self, as you must reciprocally take the coa∣gulating principle to coagulate.

The first Distillations are ever tainted with some impurities, and for the most part have a touch and savour of Empyreuma, chiefly those that without addition of any Menstruum, are made with the heat of a violent fire: as the Oyls drawn by a retort, which are thick and filled with some portion of the Volatile Salt of the Mixt, and sometimes of the fixt Salt driven up by the extreme action of fire. Therefore an Artist must be skilled in separating these different parts; so, if the extracted Oyl be filled with these impuri∣ties, or hath acquired an Empyreumatical odour, it must be rectified upon Alkalis, such as are Tartar, or Vine-ashes, or ashes of any Wood; for, the sympathy which is between Salts, will cause them to joyn together; or to speak more Philosophically, the fixt Salts will kill the volatile by their action, they being commonly sharp and acid, and so shall the Oyl ascend clear, subtile, defeca∣ted, and without that smoaky Odour, which the Volatile Salt car∣ries along with it, as a kind of smoak: And if the first Rectification

be not sufficient, it shall be reiterated upon other Salts, or upon that which hath already been used, provided it be before hand made red hot in a Crucible, to take away from it, that ill o∣dour and impurity which it had contracted in the first Rectifica∣tion.

The impurities of Spirits must be separated by rectifying them upon Earths deprived of all Salt, or upon Ashes, whose Salt shall be washt away by Lyes: because, if you did rectifie them, upon bodies that were impregnated with any Salt, the Salt should fix and keep to it self some part of the Spirit; or, if the Spirit was stronger, it would Volatilize the Salt, and carry it along with it by Sublimation, because of their mutual sympathy which binds and unites them very strictly together.

Those that have been ignorant of this doctrine of Action, Re∣action, and the several Fermentations incident to Chymistry, by the means and mixture of Salts and Spirits, have grossly erred and committed irreparable faults, as it may be observed in the reading of Chymical Practitioners.

Volatile Salts may be purified by dissolving them in their own Spirits, after which they must be filtrated to separate their heterogeneous Substances, and then drive them through low Cu∣curbits or Retorts with a wide neck: and thus shall two opera∣tions be performed at once, by rectifying the Spirit, and subliming the Volatile Salt, which is nothing else but a coagulated Spirit, or a mean substance between Salts and Spirits, by the mixture of a small portion of internal Sulphur of the Mixt whence it is ex∣tracted.

Concerning Essential Salts, such as those which are extracted out of green and juycy Plants, where Nitre or Tartar are predo∣minant, which contain in themselves the principles in which re∣sides the Essence and chief virtue of the Mixt, they must be pu∣rified either with distilled Rain-water, or the water distilled from the juyces of the same Plants; then percolate those dissolutions through common Ashes, or such as will be made, by calcining the Cakes of the Plants remaining after the juyce is drawn: that it may be instead as it were of a filtration, to remove the terres∣triety and clamminess, which might hinder the Crystallizing of the Salts; then evaporate what is percolated to a fourth part

of the whole, and expose it in a Vessel in the cold, that the Saline substance contained in the liquor may shoot in Cry∣stals.

As for the Salts, Alkali or Fixt; made by Calcination, they must be purified by reverberating the Ashes, until they become gray or whitish, then make a Lye thereof, filtrate it, and evaporate, till it be dry; and if it be the Salt of any Plant distilled, reiterate the dissolution of that first Salt in the proper water of that Plant, that the Spiritual and Essential Salt of that Plant which is in the water, may joyn with the fixt Salt, which shall be as a Magns to it, and encrease its vertue; as also it will hinder the said Salt from melting so easily when exposed to the open Air, as it would otherwise; the Salt having been thus prepared, must be exposed in the cold to Crystallize, after evaporation hath been made, till a skin covers the liquor: but if it be a Lye only, it must be evaporated, till it be dry, having first been filtrated.

From all that is said above, it may easily be conceived, that no labour nor care is to be spared, to separate and purifie all these divers Substances, since it is absolutely necessary; lest the one should prove opposite and contrary to the other, and so hinder the use and operations of our most noble Remedies, according to the true Indications of Physick: for these Substances being joyn∣ed yet together, do often more hurt and prejudice then they do service: and this mixture doth hinder, that the Preparation doth not operate (as we do intend) according to the extent of the Salts vertue, or of the Oyl and Spirit, because the faculty and vertue of one of these things, is blunted and depressed, by the Viscosity or the drought of the other. And all these general hints and directions may be applyed to all Chymical Preparations, which are not only made upon Animals and Vegetables, but also upon Minerals; and as much for those that work upon Metals, as for those which only seek Remedies for the ennobling of Physick; or such as only work for satisfaction of their Curiosity, and the tri∣al and examination of Physical Truths.