Now follows the Preparation.
If any man will prepare this Menstruum of Salt-Petre, he must extract and coagulate that Salt from the earth with common water, and adding coals or some other vegetable Sulphur, fix or calcine it so long, till it be resolv’d in the Air into a fiery liquor, then the preparation is finished. But because that sort of earth, from which this salt is extracted, cannot be found every where, in its stead, you may take Nitre well cleans’d, which must be melted in a Crucible, upon which you must cast a small quantity of coals and that so long, till the coals upon the flowing Nitre will take fire no more, but remain dead upon it, for then your Nitre is fix’d and prepar’d, so as from it, this so admirable water may be made, which is made after this manner; While the fix’d Nitre flows yet in the Crucibele, pour it into a brass mortar that in that it may cool, then beat it to powder, and spread it on a Glass table plac’d in the Cellar, or some other moist place, that there it may flow; so you have that fiery water which is endowed with so many wonderful virtues in the preparation of medicaments of vegetables, Animals and Minerals, of which I made mention before. But if you wou’d make such a liquor of Tartar, which will be best for preparation of Medicaments of vegetables and Animals, then you must bring common Tartar made pure by Calcination, Filtration, Solution and Coagulation, and by flints purg’d from all impurity, into a fair and bright Salt, mixing six or eight parts of the purest Tartar with one part of flints well pulverated, which mixture you must melt in a cover’d Crucible, and pour it into a brass Mortar to cool: This bright and white fiery mass you must reduce into powder and put it into a Glass body, and pouring rain water thereon, boil it upon hot Ashes, for then the rain water will dissolve the Tartar only, and leave the Flints at the bottom, like a Mucilaginous matter which draws to it self all the impurity of the Tartar, which before, by the common solution and filtration cou’d not be taken away, and so keeps it, that the Salt of Tartar, is by this means freed and purg’d from all impurity: then you must filtrate this solution, and draw the water from it by a limbeck, that so that Chrystalline fiery liquor may remain in the Glass: And this is that preparation by which vegetables and animals are reduced into the best medicaments; but to prepare metallick Medicaments, and especially for the making them better, liquor of Tartar is not to be added, but only liquor of the Salt of fix’d Nitre, which is not prepared by coals, but by the Regulus of Antimony, and that after this manner;
Put three parts of clean and pulverated Nitre to one part of Regulus Martis, put this mixture into a Glass wash’d clean, and by a prudent increase of fire, make it boil a little in a Fixatory Furnace, and in this degree of fire, leave it five or six hours, then take it out that it may cool, then very finely pulverize it, and pour upon it rain water, and the Nitre, which by the Regulus of Antimony comes out fix’d, wash out; and lastly abstract the water, so you will produce a fiery liquor fit for use in metallick operations.
NB. This fixation may be as well made in cover’d Crucibles, as in Glasses, and is good enough, only the management of the fire must be observed, neither let the heat from the begining be too intense, least your Nitre evaporate before it be brought to a fixation, but keep a gentle fire, and it will effect the fixation in conjunction with the Antimony.
The Praxis. How by the mediation of this liquor Vegetables, Animals, and Minerals may be converted into good Medicaments.
Take an herb, root, or seed, beat it very small in a stone Mortar, then put it into a glass, and pour upon it so much of this fiery Menstruum, as that the herb may be sufficiently imbrued in it, afterwards set it upon sand some days, or boil it, that of the herb and Menstruum may be made a thick liquor, which done put to it as much spirit of Wine, well dephlegmated, as there was of Alkahestick Liquor, and well mix them, in a small heat, lest the spirit of Wine evaporate; so long digest it, till the separation shall be made, and your Alkahest, with the fæces, will go to the bottom, but the spirit of Wine, with the Essence and Virtue of the Herb, will stay at the top, which afterward, though never so much stirr’d, will not mix, but each remains still in his own place: pour all that whole matter into a wide-mouth’d Glass, and there let it settle; then separate the Medicine which the spirit of Wine has extracted from the Herb, with a gentle inclination from the Alkahestick Liquor, which retains with it self the fæces of the Herb, so you will have the Virtue and Essence well corrected and perfectly ripen’d in the spirit of Wine, which abstract from the Essence of the herb in a Bath, and the Medicine which remains like a red juice, and endowed with great Virtues, keep and use it as it is ordain’d by God and Nature. But the Alkahestick Liquor, mixed with the fæces of the Herb, Calcine in an earthen Vessel, that all the relish and scent of the Herb, which remains in it, may be exhal’d from it, and afterwards dissolve it in Water, and filtrate it, and draw it to a fiery Liquor, so it will be as good as it was before, and you may put it to the same uses as often as you please.
Animals are to be bruised after the same manner in a Stone Mortar, and with the Alkahestick Liquor digested, and by spirit of Wine separated, and in Vegetables the labour is the same.
But Metals in their proper Corrosive Menstruums must be dissolv’d precipitated, wash’d, edulcorat’d, exsiccated, and then lastly with the Alkahestick liquor poured on, digested, dissolved, and with spirit of wine separated and reduc’d into a potability.
But Minerals which may be pulveriz’d need not be dissolv’d and brought to a calx, but ’tis sufficient, that after pulverisation with the Alkahestick liquor poured on, they be digested, and by spirit of wine separated.