rosie of Metals, to purifie and to transmute them
into the best Gold._

_Written by that Noble and Learned Philosopher_, Roger Bacon.

_Stibium_ or _Antimony_, as the Philosophers say, is composed of a Noble
Mineral Sulphur, which they accounted to be the black secret Lead of the
Wise.

The _Arabians_ call it _Asmat_ or _Azmat_; the Alchymists retain the
Name _Antimony_.

_Addition._ The _Moors_ call it _Antimony_, others call it _Alabaster_,
or _Tarbason_. By the _Arabians_ and _Spaniards_ it is called _Alcohol_.
_Avicennae_ c. 7. calls it _Artemed_. _Alexius_ of _Piedmont_, in his
seventh Book of Secrets, calls it _Talck_, even as _John Jacob Wecker_
renders it in his Books of Secrets; but _Talck_ is far different from
_Antimony_. _Pliny_, Book 33. Chap. 6. of _Antimony_. _Dioscorides_
gives a preparation of _Antimony_, Book 5. Chap. 39. They call it also
_Stibi_, _Stimmi_, _&c._ The _Germans_ call it _Spies glass_, or as
_George Fabricius_ would rather have it, _Spies glantz_. _Gerlandius_
calls it Black _Alcophil_, _Altofel_, or _Alirnu_, others _Cosmet_, and
it is twofold, Masculine and Feminine.

It will lead us to the consideration of higher Mysteries, if we behold
and discern that Nature wherein Gold is exalted, even as the _Magi_ have
found that this Mineral is by God ordained under the Constellation of
_Aries_, which is the first Celestial Sign, wherein the Sun takes its
Exaltation, though this be not regarded by the Vulgar; yet discreet
people will know, and the better observe, that even in this place also
the Mysteries and Perpetuity may in part be considered with great
benefit, and in part discovered.

But some ignorant and indiscreet people think, that when they had
_Antimony_, they would deal well enough with it by Calcination, others
by Sublimation, and some by Reverberation, thereby to obtain its great
Mystery and perfect Medicine. But I tell you, that here in this place
it availes not in the least, either Calcination, Sublimation, or
Reverberation, whereby afterwards a perfect extraction can or might be
done or effected with profit, to transmute the meaner into a better
Metallick virtue; for it is impossible for you.

Be not deluded; some of the Philosophers which have wrote of such
things, as _Geber_, _Albertus Magnus_, _Rasis_, _Rupecissa_,
_Aristotle_, and many others: But observe this: Some say, that if
_Antimony_ be made to a _Vitrum_ or Glass, the bad volatile Sulphur is
gone, and the