principles--since "body" may be neglected as unimportant (a false view,
I think, by the way) or "soul" and "spirit" may be united under one
head--OR into three; whereas the postulation of THREE principles on
a sexual basis is impossible. JOANNES ISAACUS HOLLANDUS (fifteenth
century) is the earliest author in whose works I have observed explicit
mention of THREE principles, though he refers to them in a manner
seeming to indicate that the doctrine was no new one in his day. I have
only read one little tract of his; there is nothing sexual in it, and
the author's mental character may be judged from his remarks concerning
"the three flying spirits"--taste, smell, and colour. These, he writes,
"are the life, soule, and quintessence of every thing, neither can these
three spirits be one without the other, as the Father, the Son, and
the Holy Ghost are one, yet three Persons, and one is not without the
other."(1d)

(2a) Mr WAITE's translation, p. 79.

(1b) BERNARD, Earl of TREVISAN: _A Treatise of the Philosopher's Stone_,
1683. (See _Collectanea Chymica: A Collection of Ten Several Treatises
in Chymistry_, 1684, p. 92.)

(2b) _Ibid_., p. 91.

(1c) EDWARD KELLY: _The Stone of the Philosophers_. (See _The Alchemical
Writings of_ EDWARD KELLY, edited by A. E. WAITE, 1893, pp. 9 and 11 to
13.)

(2c) _The Answer of_ BERNARDUS TREVISANUS, _to the Epistle of Thomas
of Bononira, Physician to K. Charles the 8th_. (See JOHN FREDERICK
HOUPREGHT: _Aurifontina Chymica_, 1680, p. 208.)

(1d) _One Hundred and Fourteen Experiments and Cures of the Famous
Physitian_ THEOPHRASTUS PARACELSUS. _Whereunto is added... certain
Secrets of_ ISAAC HOLLANDUS, _concerning the Vegetall and Animall Work_
(1652), pp. 29 and 30.

When the alchemists described an element or principle as male or female,
they meant what they said, as I have already intimated, to the extent,
at least, of firmly believing that seed was produced by the two metallic
sexes. By their union metals were thought to be produced in the womb of
the earth; and mines were shut in order that by the birth and growth of
new metal the impoverished veins might be replenished. In this way, too,
was the _magnum opus_, the generation of the Philosopher's Stone--in
species gold, but purer than the purest--to be accomplished. To conjoin
that which Nature supplied, to foster the growth and development of that
which was thereby produced; such was the task of the alchemist. "For
there are Ve