ity of
Amsterdam. He there hired a magnificent house, established an equipage
which eclipsed in brilliancy those of the richest merchants, and assumed
the title of Excellency. Where he got the money to live in this expensive
style was long a secret: the adepts in alchymy easily explained it, after
their fashion. Sensible people were of opinion that he had come by it in a
less wonderful manner; for it was remembered that among his unfortunate
disciples in Milan, there were many rich men, who, in conformity with one
of the fundamental rules of the sect, had given up all their earthly
wealth into the hands of their founder. In whatever manner the money was
obtained, Borri spent it in Holland with an unsparing hand, and was looked
up to by the people with no little respect and veneration. He performed
several able cures, and increased his reputation so much that he was
vaunted as a prodigy. He continued diligently the operations of alchymy,
and was in daily expectation that he should succeed in turning the
inferior metals into gold. This hope never abandoned him, even in the
worst extremity of his fortunes; and in his prosperity it led him into the
most foolish expenses: but he could not long continue to live so
magnificently upon the funds he had brought from Italy; and the
philosopher's stone, though it promised all for the wants of the morrow,
never brought any thing for the necessities of to-day. He was obliged in a
few months to retrench, by giving up his large house, his gilded coach and
valuable blood-horses, his liveried domestics, and his luxurious
entertainments. With this diminution of splendour came a diminution of
renown. His cures did not appear so miraculous, when he went out on foot
to perform them, as they had seemed when "his Excellency" had driven to a
poor man's door in his carriage with six horses. He sank from a prodigy
into an ordinary man. His great friends shewed him the cold shoulder, and
his humble flatterers carried their incense to some other shrine. Borri
now thought it high time to change his quarters. With this view he
borrowed money wherever he could get it, and succeeded in obtaining two
hundred thousand florins from a merchant named De Meer, to aid, as he
said, in discovering the water of life. He also obtained six diamonds of
great value, on pretence that he could remove the flaws from them without
diminishing their weight. With this booty he stole away secretly by night,
and proceeded to H