[185] It so happens that he went to see him and fell into the trap of the Jew. Garinet is the authority for the imaginary visit to the court of St. Louis. He follows Sauval.
[186] This paragraph is adapted from Garinet, Hist. de la Magie en France, p. 76.
[187] Many treatises on alchemy have been fathered on Albertus Magnus, including Libellus de Alchymia and Concordantia Philosophorum.
[188] According to the Zohar, Adam was formed of earth brought from the four quarters, and this is really an allusion to the symbolic correspondence between the parts of his personality and the four elements of ancient physics.
[189] The universal secret which was sought by mystic Alchemy was more truly that of the life of life; it was the quest of transmutation in God.
[190] The thesis of physical Alchemy was that Nature always intended to produce gold but was thwarted by the impurity of the media amidst which she worked under the earth. The inferior metals resulted. The end of Hermetic art was to complete the design of Nature and raise what is base to perfection.
[191] St. Thomas Aquinas wrote eight treatises on alchemy, if the ascriptions of the literature could be trusted. They are of the same authenticity as those of Albertus Magnus.
[192] The study in question was enjoined in a particular manner by Leo XIII.
[193] I do not know or have forgotten how this legend originated, but in any case no works on transmutation have been imputed to St. Dominic, which leads me to think that the story of his adeptship did not attain any considerable currency.
[194] A fragment of Ostanes is included in the Byzantine collection of ancient alchemists. Romarius should read Comarius, whose tract in the same collection is supposed to be addressed to Cleopatra. Salmanas wrote on the fabrication of artificial pearls and was supposed to be an Arab. A treatise on weights and measures is attributed to Cleopatra and there are also some Latin forgeries. The other names are well known in the literature of Alchemy.