zes the true mystic he sought to cast

Light on a darkling race; save for that doubt,
I stood at first where all aspire at last
To stand: the secret of the world was mine.
I knew, I felt (perception unexpressed,
Uncomprehended by our narrow thought,
But somehow felt and known in every shift
And change in the spirit,--nay, in every pore
Of the body, even)--what God is, what we are,
What life is--. . .(6)

(6) Robert Browning: Paracelsus, closing speech.

Much has been done of late to clear up his story and his character.
Professor Sudhoff, of Leipzig, has made an exhaustive bibliographical
study of his writings,(7) there have been recent monographs by Julius
Hartmann, and Professors Franz and Karl Strunz,(8) and a sympathetic
summary of his life and writings has been published by the late Miss
Stoddart.(9) Indeed there is at present a cult of Paracelsus. The
hermetic and alchemical writings are available in English in the edition
of A. E. Waite, London, 1894. The main facts of his life you can find
in all the biographies. Suffice it here to say that he was born at
Einsiedeln, near Zurich, in 1493, the son of a physician, from whom
he appears to have had his early training both in medicine and in
chemistry. Under the famous abbot and alchemist, Trithemiusof Wurzburg,
he studied chemistry and occultism. After working in the mines at
Schwatz he began his wanderings, during which he professes to have
visited nearly all the countries in Europe and to have reached India
and China. Returning to Germany he began a triumphal tour of practice
through the German cities, always in opposition to the medical faculty,
and constantly in trouble. He undoubtedly performed many important
cures, and was thought to have found the supreme secret of alchemistry.
In the pommel of his sword he was believed to carry a familiar spirit.
So dominant was his reputation that in 1527 he was called to the chair
of physic in the University of Basel. Embroiled in quarrels after
his first year he was forced to leave secretly, and again began his
wanderings through German cities, working, quarrelling, curing, and
dying prematurely at Saltzburg in 1541--one of the most tragic figures
in the history of medicine.

(7) Professor Sudhoff: Bibliographia Paracelsica, Berlin, 1894,
1899.

(8) R. Julius Hartmann: Theophrast von Hohenheim, Berlin, 1904;
ditto, Franz Strunz, Leipzig, 190