ALCHEMY (Ar. al, the + kintiya, from late Gk. vili[e]ia, eh Ent felia; see below). Alchemy is to modern chemistry what astrology is to astronomy, or legend to history. In the eye of the astrologer, a knowledge of the stars was val uable as a means of foretelling, or even of influ encing, future events. In like manner. the gen uine alchemist toiled with his crucibles and alembics, calcining, subliming, distilling, with two grand objects, as illusory as those of the astrologer—to discover, namely, (1 ) the secret of transmuting the baser metals into gold and silver, and (2) the means of indefinitely pro longing human life.
Tradition points to Egypt as the birthplace of the science. The god Hermes Trismcgistus is represented as the father of it; and the most probable etymology of the name is that which con nects it with the most ancient and native name of Egypt, Chcnii (the Scripture Chain or Ham). The Greeks and Romans under the empire would seem to have become acquainted with it from the Egyptians: there is no reason to believe that in early times either people had the name or the thing. Chernia (Gk. cheiocia) occurs in the lexicon of Suidas. written about the elev enth century, and is explained by him to be "the conversion of silver and gold." It is to the Arabs, from whom Europe got the name and the art, that the term owes the prefixed article al. As if a/Ionia had been a generic term em bracing all common chemical operations, such as the decocting and compounding of ordinary drugs, the grand operation of transmutation was denominated the ellealia (al-elicmy)—the chemistry of chemistries. The Roman Emperor Caligula is said to have instituted experiments for the producing of gold out of orpiment (sul phide of arsenic) ; and in the time of Diocletian, the passion for this pursuit, conjoined with mag ical arts, had become so prevalent in the Empire, that that Emperor is said to have ordered all Egyptian works treating of the chemistry of gold and silver to be burned. For at that time mnItitudes of books on this art were appearing, written by Alexandrine monks and by hermits, but bearing famous names of antiquity. such as Democritus, Pythagoras, and Hermes.
At a later period, the Arabs took up the art, and it is to them that European alchemy is directly traceable. The school of polypharmacy,
as it has been called, flourished in Arabia during the caliphate of the Abbassides. The earliest work of this school now known is the Sununa Perfretionis. or "Summit of Perfection," com posed by Ocher (q.v.) about the eighth century; it is consequently the oldest book on chemistry proper in the world. It contains so much of what sounds very much like jargon in modern ears, that Dr. Johnson ascribes the origin of the word "gibberish" to the name of the compiler. Yet, when viewed in its true light, it is a wonder ful performance. It is a kind of text-book, or collection of all that was then known and be lieved. It appears that these Arabian poly pharmists had long been engaged in firing and boiling, dissolving and precipitating, subliming and coagulating chemical substances. They worked with gold and mercury, arsenic and sul phur, salts and acids, and had, in short, become familiar with a large range of what are now called chemicals. Other taught that there are three elemental chemicals —mercury, sulphur, and arsenic. These substances, especially the first. two, seem to have fascinated the thoughts of the alchemists by their potent and penetrating qualities. They saw mercury dissolve gold, the most incorruptible of matters, as water dissolves sugar; and a stick of sulphur presented to hot iron penetrates it like a spirit, and makes it run down in a shower of solid drops, a new and remarkable substance,. possessed of properties belonging neither to iron nor to sulphur. The Arabians held that the metals are compound bodies, made up of mercury and sulphur in dif ferent proportions. With these very excusable errors in theory, they were genuine practical chemists. They toiled away at the art of making "many (polypharmacy) out of the various mixtures and reactions of such chemicals as they knew. They had their pestles an mor tars, their crucibles and furnaces, their alembics and aludels, their vessels for infusion, for decoc tion, for cohabitation, sublimation, fixation, lix iviation, filtration, coagulation, etc. Their scien tific creed was transmutation, and their methods were mostly blind gropings; and yet, in this way, they found out many a new substance and invent ed many a useful process.