irenaeus Philalethes lived until
at least 1678. Miss Vaughan states that he must have been alive in that
year, because he then published the _Ripley Revived_, and the _Enarratio
Trium Gebri Medicinarum_. She declares that the author of the
_Enarratio_ mentions the pains taken about that edition (p. 240). I do
not find any prefatory matter in this book at all. There is a preface to
the _Ripley Revived_, but this was written long before 1678, for it
mentions the _Introitus Apertus_, published in 1667, as still in
manuscript. Neither Jean Lange, the editor of the _Introitus Apertus_ of
1667, writing 9th December, 1666, nor William Cooper, the editor of the
English translation[39] of 1669, writing 15th September, 1668, know
whether the author is still alive. In fact he cannot be shown to have
outlived Thomas Vaughan, for there is no proof that the adept who showed
the philosopher's stone to Helvetius on December 27th, 1666,[40] was the
same as he who showed it to George Starkey many years before. I will
briefly enumerate a few other links which connect Eirenaeus Philalethes
with Thomas Vaughan. A German translation of the _Introitus Apertus_,
published at Hamburg under the title of _Abyssus Alchemiae_ (1704), is
said on the title-page to be "von T. de Vagan." Miss Vaughan states that
a similar translation of the first of the _Tres Tractatus_, published at
Hamburg in 1705, also bears this name (p. 237), and this is borne out by
Lenglet-Dufresnoy (iii. 261-6), who speaks of a French MS. of the _Tres
Tractatus_ inscribed "par Thomas de Vagan, dit Philalethe ou Martin
Birrhius." Birrhius, however, was only the editor. These ascriptions are
probably made on the authority of G. W. Wedelius, who in his preface,
dated 2nd Sept., 1698, to an edition of the _Introitus Apertus_,
published at Jena in 1699, says of the author:--"Ex Anglia tamen vulgo
habetur oriundus ... et Thomas De Vagan appellatus." The English _Three
Tracts_ (1694) are stated on the title-page to have been written in
Latin by Eirenaeus Philalethes; but there is a note in the British
Museum Catalogue to the effect that the Latin original has the name
_Eugenius_ Philalethes. Unfortunately this Latin _Tres Tractatus_,
published in 1668 by Martin Birrhius at Amsterdam, is not in the
Library, and I cannot verify the statement. Finally, I may note that the
_Ripley Revived_ (1678) has an engraved title-page by Robert Vaughan,
who also did the title-page to _Olor Iscanus_, an