DENIS ZACHAIRE.
It appears that the true name of this persevering and indefatigable seeker after the end and truth of alchemy has not in reality come down to us, that which is placed at the head of his Opusculum Chimicum being simply pseudonymous. It is to this little work that we are indebted for one of the most singular histories in the annals of the Hermetic art.
Denis Zachaire was born of a noble family, in an unmentioned part of Guienne, during the year 1510. He was sent, as a youth, to Bordeaux, under the care of a tutor, to prosecute the study of philosophy and belles lettres. His preceptor, however, had a passion for alchemy, and inoculated his pupil with the fatal fever of the sages. They speedily abandoned the common academical courses for the thorny pathways of the magnum opus, and Denis, in particular, devoted himself to the assiduous compilation of a vast volume of Hermetic receipts, indicating a thousand processes, with a thousand various materials, for the successful manufacture of gold. From Bordeaux he proceeded to Toulouse, still in the society of his tutor, and for the ostensible study of law, but in reality for the experimental practice of alchemy. Two hundred crowns with which they were supplied for their maintenance during the next two years were speedily expended in the purchase of furnaces, instruments, and drugs, for the literal execution of the processes contained in the books of the adepts.
“Before the end of the year,” as he himself informs us, “my two hundred crowns were gone in smoke, and my tutor died of a fever he took in summer from his close attention to the furnace, which he erected in his chamber, and stayed there continually in extreme heat. His death afflicted me much, and still more as my parents refused to supply me with money, except what was just necessary for my support. I was therefore unable to proceed in my grand work.
“To overcome these difficulties I went home in 1535, being of age, to put myself out of guardianship; and I disposed of some of my property for four hundred crowns. This sum was necessary to execute a process which was given me in Toulouse, by an Italian, who said he saw it proved. I kept him living with me, to see the end of his process.
“We dissolved gold and silver in various sorts of strong waters, but it was all in vain; we did not recover from the solution one half of the gold and silver which we had put into it. My four hundred crowns were reduced to two hundred and thirty, of which I gave twenty to the Italian, to proceed to Milan, where, he said, the author of the process lived, and whence he would return with his explanations. I remained at Toulouse all the winter, awaiting him, and I might have tarried there still, as I never have heard of him since.
“In the ensuing summer the city being visited by the plague, I went to Cahors, and there continued for six months. I did not lose sight of my work, and became acquainted with an old man who was called the philosopher, a name given in the country to any one of superior information. I communicated to him my practices and asked his advice. He mentioned ten or twelve processes which he thought better than others. I returned to Toulouse when the plague ceased, and renewed my labours accordingly. The only consequence was that my money was all spent, except one hundred and seventy crowns. To continue my operations with more certainty, I made acquaintance with an abbé, who dwelt in the neighbourhood of this city. He was taken with a passion for the same pursuit as myself, and he informed me that one of his friends, who lived with Cardinal Armanac, had sent him a process from Rome which he believed genuine, but it would cost two hundred crowns. I agreed to furnish one half of this sum, and he gave the rest, so we began to work together. Our process required a large supply of spirits of wine. I purchased a cask of excellent wine, from which I drew the spirit and rectified it many times. We took two pounds weight of it and half a pound weight of gold, which we had calcined for a month. These were included in a pelican and placed in a furnace. This work lasted a year, but, not to remain idle, we made some other experiments to amuse ourselves, and from which we expected to draw sufficient profit to pay the cost of our great work.
“The year 1537 passed over without any change appearing in the subject of our labours. We might have remained through our whole lives in the same state, for we should have known that the perfect metals are unaltered by vegetable or animal substances. We took out our powder and made projection upon hot quicksilver, but it was in vain! Judge then of our grief, especially as the abbé had notified to all his monks that they would have to melt the lead cistern of their house in order that he might convert it into gold as soon as our operations were finished.
“My bad success could not make me desist. I again raised four hundred crowns on my property; the abbé did the same, and I set out for Paris, a city containing more alchemists than any other in the world. I resolved to remain there as long as the eight hundred crowns lasted, or until I succeeded in my object. This journey drew on me the displeasure of my relations, and the censure of my friends, who imagined I was a studious lawyer. However, I made them believe that the design of my sojourn in Paris was the purchase of a situation in the law courts.
“After travelling for fifteen days I arrived at Paris in January 1539. I remained a month almost unknown, but no sooner had I visited the furnace makers and conversed with some amateurs than I became acquainted with more than a hundred artists, who were all at work in different ways. Some laboured to extract the mercury of metals and afterwards to fix it. A variety of systems were held by others, and scarcely a day passed in which some of them did not visit me, even on Sundays and the most sacred festivals of the Church, to hear what I had done.
“In these conversations one said:—‘If I had the means to begin again, I should produce something good.’ Another—‘Would that my vessel had been strong enough to resist the force of what it contained.’ Another—‘If I had possessed a round copper vessel well closed, I would have fixed mercury with silver.’ There was not one without a reasonable excuse for his failure, but I was deaf to all their discourses, recollecting my experience as the dupe of similar expectations.
“I was tempted, nevertheless, by a Greek who had a process with cinnabar, which failed. At the same time I became acquainted with a strange gentleman, newly arrived, who often, in my presence, sold the fruit of his operations to the goldsmiths. I was a long time frequenting his company, but he did not consent to inform me of his secret. At last I prevailed over him, but it was only a refinement of metals more ingenious than the rest. I failed not to write to the abbé, at Toulouse, enclosing a copy of the process of the stranger, and imagining that I had attained some useful knowledge, he advised me to remain another year at Paris, since I had made so good a beginning.
“After all, as to the philosophers’ stone, I succeeded no better than before. I had been three years at Paris, and my money was nearly expended, when I had a letter from the abbé, informing me that he had something to communicate, and that I should join him as soon as possible.
“On my arrival at Toulouse, I found that he had a letter from King Henry of Navarre, who was a lover of philosophy, and who requested that I should proceed to Pau, in Berne, to teach him the secret I had received from the stranger at Paris. He would recompense me with three or four thousand crowns. The mention of this sum exhilarated the abbé, and he never let me rest till I set out to wait on the prince. I arrived at Pau in May 1542. I found the prince a very curious personage. By his command I went to work, and succeeded according to the process I knew. When it was finished I obtained the expected recompense, but although the king wished to serve me further, he was dissuaded by the lords of his court, even by those who had engaged me to come to him. He dismissed me with great acknowledgments, desiring me to see if there was anything in his estates which would gratify me, such as confiscations or the like, and that he would give them to me with pleasure. These promises, which meant nothing, did not lead me to entertain the hopes of a courtier, and I returned to the abbé at Toulouse.
“On my road I heard of a religious man, who was very skilful in natural philosophy. I went to visit him; he lamented my misfortunes, and said, with a friendly zeal, that he advised me to amuse myself no longer with these various particular operations, which were all false and sophistical, but that I should rather peruse the best books of the ancient philosophers, as well to know the true matter as the right order that should be pursued in the practice of this science.
“I felt the truth of this safe counsel, but before I put it in execution, I went to see my friend at Toulouse, to give him an account of the eight hundred crowns that we had put in common, and to divide with him the recompense I had received from the King of Navarre. If he proved not content with all I told him, he was still less so at the resolution I had taken to discontinue my operations. Of our eight hundred crowns, we had but eighty-six left. I departed from him, and returned home, intending to go to Paris, and there remain until I was fixed in my theory of reading the works of the adepts. I reached Paris in 1546, and remained there a year, assiduously studying the Turba Philosophorum, the good Trévisan, the “Remonstrance of Nature,” and some other of the best books. But as I had no first principles, I knew not on what to determine.
“At length I went out of my solitude, not to see my old acquaintances, the searchers after particular tinctures and minor works, but to frequent those who proceeded in the great process by the books of the genuine adepts. I was, nevertheless, disappointed herein, by the confusion and disagreement of their theories, by the variety of their works, and of their different operations. Excited by a sort of inspiration, I gave myself up to the study of Raymond Lully and Arnold de Villa Nova. My reading and meditation continued another year. I then formed my plan, and only waited to sell the remainder of my land to enable me to go home, and put my resolution into practice. I commenced at Christmas, 1549, and after some preparations, having procured everything that was necessary, I began my process, not without inquietude and difficulty. A friend said to me:—“What are you going to do? have you not lost enough by this delusion?” Another assured me that if I continued to purchase so much coal, I should be suspected of counterfeiting coin, of which he had already heard a rumour. Another said I ought to follow my business of a lawyer. But I was chiefly tormented by my relations, who reproached me bitterly with my conduct, and threatened to bring the officers of justice into my house to break my furnaces in pieces.
“I leave you to judge my trouble and grief at this opposition. I found no consolation but in my work, which prospered from day to day, and to which I was very attentive. The interruption of all commerce, which was occasioned by the plague, gave me the opportunity of great solitude, in which I could examine with undisturbed satisfaction the success of the three colours which mark the true work. I thus arrived at the perfection of the tincture, and made an essay of its virtue on common quicksilver, on Easter Monday, 1550. In less than an hour it was converted into pure gold. You may guess how joyful I was, but I took care not to boast. I thanked God for the favour he shewed me, and prayed that I should be permitted to use it but for His glory.
“The next day I set out to find the abbé, according to the promise we gave each other, to communicate our discoveries. On my way, I called at the house of the religious man who had assisted me by his good advice. I had the grief to find that both he and the abbé had been dead about six months. I did not go back to my house, but sought another place, to await the arrival of one of my relations whom I had left at my dwelling. I sent him a procuration to sell all that I possessed, both house and furniture, to pay my debts, and to distribute the remainder among those of my relations who were in want. He soon after rejoined me, and we set out for Lausanne, in Switzerland, resolved to pass our days without ostentation in some of the celebrated cities of Germany.”
In his unknown retreat[V] the adept recorded his adventures and experiences when in search of the philosophical stone, ut divertarem bonos piosque vivos, à sophisticationibus, ad viam rectam perfectionis in hoc opere divino. His little work is entitled simply Opusculum Chemicum; it opens with the romantic narrative which I have cited almost in extenso. It calls Hermes magnus propheta noster, insists that the art is the gift of God alone on the authority of all the initiates, and quotes so largely from previous writers that it can scarcely be considered an original work on the Hermetic philosophy.
The life of Bernard Trévisan has abundantly testified to the physical nature of his object, which is amply confirmed by this treatise. The methods of projection upon metals, the composition of precious stones, and the application of the tincture as a medicine for the human body, are successively considered. One grain of the divinum opus, dissolved in white wine, transmutes that liquor into a rich citron colour, and has innumerable hygienic uses.
FOOTNOTES:
[V] See Appendix I.