ve it, he fell in with a monk as mad as himself upon the subject of
transmutation. They were, however, both so poor that they could not afford
to buy the proper materials to work with. They kept up each other's
spirits by learned discourses on the hermetic philosophy, and in the
reading of all the great authors who had written upon the subject. Thus
did they nurse their folly, as the good wife of Tam O'Shanter did her
wrath, "to keep it warm." After Bernard had resided about a year in
Rhodes, a merchant, who knew his family, advanced him the sum of eight
thousand florins, upon the security of the last-remaining acres of his
formerly large estate. Once more provided with funds, he recommenced his
labours with all the zeal and enthusiasm of a young man. For three years
he hardly stepped out of his laboratory: he ate there, and slept there,
and did not even give himself time to wash his hands and clean his beard,
so intense was his application. It is melancholy to think that such
wonderful perseverance should have been wasted in so vain a pursuit, and
that energies so unconquerable should have had no worthier field to strive
in. Even when he had fumed away his last coin, and had nothing left in
prospective to keep his old age from starvation, hope never forsook him.
He still dreamed of ultimate success, and sat down a grey-headed man of
eighty, to read over all the authors on the hermetic mysteries, from Geber
to his own day, lest he should have misunderstood some process, which it
was not yet too late to recommence. The alchymists say, that he succeeded
at last, and discovered the secret of transmutation in his eighty-second
year. They add that he lived three years afterwards to enjoy his wealth.
He lived, it is true, to this great age, and made a valuable
discovery--more valuable than gold or gems. He learned, as he himself
informs us, just before he had attained his eighty-third year, that the
great secret of philosophy was contentment with our lot. Happy would it
have been for him if he had discovered it sooner, and before he became
decrepit, a beggar, and an exile!

He died at Rhodes, in the year 1490, and all the alchymists of Europe sang
elegies over him, and sounded his praise as the "good Trevisan." He wrote
several treatises upon his chimera, the chief of which are, the _Book of
Chemistry_, the _Verbum dimissum_, and an essay _De Natura Ovi_.

TRITHEMIUS.

The name of this eminent man has become famous in the