Essais chimiques d’eckartshausen

Statement of Conceptions on Radical Dissolution

Radical dissolution consists in perfect penetration, that is to say: that the constituent substance as well as the agent of the solution penetrate the object to be dissolved.

When this penetration is not effective, there is no radical dissolution, but only a mechanical partition, in which the substances do not act on each other, but only on each other. . This explains why metallic lime (oxides) increase in weight, while the radical dissolution of metals by phosphorus produces light and resinous bodies.

During radical dissolution, perfect chemical penetration takes place; the internal is affected and not only the external binding parts. This is why the "solvens" completely mixes with its "soluto".

In noble metals, the fundamental substances are associated in such a way that they cannot be separated neither by nature, nor by art, nor by any foreign means.

But, as soon as noble metals are manipulated with: da fundamental basic substance, which is also their element, they gradually melt in it, like ice in water, and spread in their solvent.

This radical dissolution is a gentle fusion which must take place without destroying the metallic form; that is why the means of radical dissolution must be of the same nature as the object to be dissolved.

But the medium of radical fusion and dissolution must be of the same nature, that is, it must consist of the essential substances and forces of which the perfect metal itself is made, and also possess the same elements, but in a fluid state and in a higher degree of activity.

One such medium is the Universal Menstruum,

the Philosophical Mercury of Nature, the dragon whose head eats its own tail.

This Universal can, after having absorbed the internal of the metal, thicken in this body called the Stone, capable of uniting then with other metals purified and dilated by fire, in order to bring them to their own supreme perfection and to make them the redeemers of, the rest of the imperfect metals

; this perfection is called transmutation, but is simply a radical reunion of metallic principles which, by this reunion, necessarily change their exterior form.

Secular chemistry is exhausted in its work to multiply, by new combinations, the species of metals already known; it has already brought up to twenty different metals, instead of trying to reduce them all to a single species (which is, in short, in the mineral realm, the goal of Nature), in order to come closer to the knowledge of metallic nature.

So far, therefore, modern chemistry has only known the mechanical separation of substance from metals: true radical dissolution, which is the only true solution, transfusio per minima and complete penetration, is unknown to the common science.

To animate a body is to say: transmit this caloric substance to it and, through it, give it penetration, subtlety and movement.

The animate alone can in turn animate; to make metals alive means to animate them.