Three-principle theory Paracelsus

The next step away from the traditions of antiquity involved the addition of a third principle to Jabir s sulphur and mercury salt. Whereas the first two were components of metals, salt was considered an essential ingredient of living bodies. In this way alchemical theory became more than a theory of metallurgy and embraced all the material world. The three-principle theory is generally attributed to the Swiss alchemist Paracelsus (1493-1541), although it is probably older. Paracelsus asserted that sulphur, salt, and mercury form everything that lies in the four elements . 

In Chap. 3, Jo Hedesan addresses Boyle s Sceptical Chymist as a case study for theory choice in the 17th cenmry. The original discussion focuses on three competing theories concerning the chemical components of matter the four-element theory of Aristotle, the three-principle theory of Paracelsus and the atomistic theory. Hedesan argues, that in effect the book is an attack on Paracelsianism by Boyle. This is evident from the fact that the other two theories fall out of the discussion quite early in the text. In the history of Chemistry, this seminal text is often taken as a successful attack on Paracelsianism. 

The Sceptical Chymist, which is written in the form of a dialogue between five people (two of whom mysteriously disappear in the part following the second title page and reappear near the end of the book), is a discussion of the chemical philosophies that prevailed in Boyle s day, the Aristotelian theory of the four elements and Paracelsus s theory of three principles. Boyle discusses them in exhaustive detail in order to foster skepticism concerning them. 

Adopted with some important changes by Plato and Aristotle, the doctrine of the four elements became the generally accepted theory of matter until the rival doctrine of the three principles, the tra prima of Paracelsus, appeared, in the sixteenth century. 

The works of these practical chemists of the sixteenth century manifest a more serious appreciation of the dignity and importance of chemistry in its relation to the practical arts, and had a great stimulating influence on all chemical workers. It will be noticed however that with the exception of Paracelsus these men were not greatly interested in the problems of chemical philosophy. To the extent that they refer to chemical theory they accept the conventional Aristotelian or Arabian concepts. Paracelsus by the- impression made by his three principles indeed did much to shatter the blind faith in the ancient theories and to pave the way for later constructive speculation. In so far as chemical theory is concerned the sixteenth century marks... 

As a student of medicine he was strongly influenced by the works of Paracelsus, not only by his progressive ideas, but also by his transcendental and mystical philosophy. Van Helmont resembled Paracelsus, however, too much in his disregard of traditional authority to be a blind follower of Paracelsus. While he accepted some of the latter s most characteristic ideas, as the Archaeus presiding over functions of digestion, etc., he rejected some of his more prominent theories as, for example, the three principles of matter. 

It is difficult to see in the characteristics and properties of the three earths of Becher any substantial improvement on the tria prima of Paracelsus and his successors, other than the avoidance of the use of the three names which were in common use in two different meanings. For the three principles of that name, as chemists of that school took great pains constantly to explain, were not the same as the common substances so named. Nevertheless, the new name terra pinguis or fatty earth for the older sulphur, as the substance which departs in combustion, certainly gave the stimulus which incited Stahl and his followers to develop the influential phlogistic hypothesis and Becher thus played a not unimportant part in the history of chemical theory. 

Medieval alchemists had generally adhered to a dyad theory, in which Sulfur and Mercury were the principles of all metals and change was produced by the interaction of these two principles. Substances rich in Sulfur were more combustible, while those rich in Mercury were less so. Paracelsus took this dyad theory and added a third principle of Salt to it. His three principles—the tria prima, or three first things—were able to explain the alchemical transformations of all bodies. This material trinity matched the Holy Trinity in heaven as well as the three principles of which we are made vital spirit, soul, and body. Important in this scheme are correspondences between the great world, the... 

In terms of the theory of elements, Paracelsus s contribution was not his work, although he did write about how the three principles made up most of terrestrial matter, but his role in the redirection of alchemy. He de-emphasized the concept of transmutation (although it is likely he believed it possible) and focused on practical aspects of the study of matter, particularly iatrochemistry. He also encouraged the investigation of materials through experiments. While this should not be confused with modern experimentalism, since Paracelsus included spiritualism and occult theory in his system of investigation, it was far more systematic than most alchemy tended to be. He also based his work on a conception of pure compounds, and that concept, in turn, led to work on purification and qualitative control of chemical research and production. 

Robert Boyle (1627-1691) is noted for his pioneer experiments on the properties of gases and his espousal of a corpuscular view of matter that was a forerunner of the modem theory of chemical elements and atomic theory. Boyle conducted pioneering experiments in which he demonstrated the physical characteristics of air and the necessity of air for combustion and respiration. In 1661, he described, in the second edition of his work. New Experiments Physio-Mechanical, the relationship, known as Boyle s Law, of the volume of gases and pressure. Attacking the Aristotelian theory of the four elements (earth, air, fire, and water) and the three principles (salt, sulphur and mercury), proposed by Paracelsus, in The Skeptical Chymist, he can be considered as the founder of modem chemistry. " ... 

Traditional accounts of Robert Boyle s matter theory, such as Marie Boas Hall s 1952 Establishment of the Mechanical Philosophy, explicitly view Boyle s mechanical philosophy as an importation from physics, which he grafted onto a radically rewritten chemistry. As Boas Hall puts it, Boyle s new chemistry was a chemistry in which was incorporated a physicist s view of matter. The physicist s matter theory refers, of course, to the very corpuscularian philosophy to which Boyle devoted his life s work, the explanation of phenomena in terms of matter and motion at the microlevel. According to Boas Hall, this physicist s theory was radically opposed to the chymical theory that predated Boyle and that he sometimes criticized—particularly the theory of three principles, mercury, sulfur, and salt, invented by Paracelsus in the early sixteenth century. The Paracelsian concept of the tria prima was, to paraphrase Boas Hall, a theory of forms and qualities, an animistic rewriting of Aristotle in the language of alchemy. A brief glance at Steven Shapin s 2996 The Scientific Revolution will show that the approach of Boas Hall is alive and well, hr his treatment of the mechanical philosophy as a whole. 

Paracelsus made an important contribution to chemical theory. He extended the sulphur-mercury theory of the Islamic alchemists by adding a third principle, namely salt. Thus, when wood burned, the combustible component was identified with sulphur, the volatile component with mercury and the ashes that remained with salt. The composition of all substances could be expressed in terms of these three principles, or tria prima. As in the previous theories, sulphur, mercury and... 

The tria prima was the brainchild of the Swiss physician, philosopher and alchemist Theophrastus von Hohenheim, best known as Paracelsus (1493-1541). According to Paracelsus s mature theory, all matter was comprised of Salt, Sulphur and Mercury [2]. His idea was clearly an extension and augmentation of the medieval alchemical theory of Sulphur and Mercury, which has been referred to in the previous chapter. Paracelsus modified the Sulphur-Mercury theory in two major ways by adding a third principle, Salt, and by expanding it beyond metals. The three principles came to constitute the building blocks of aU beings in the universe. 

From another point of view matter was considered by the medieval philosophers as composed of body, spirit and soul. Body was that which gave solidity and permanence, spirit was that which fled from the fire or was volatile. Soul was not very intelligibly defined, and not so generally adopted. Paracelsus crystallized these vague theories into a more tangible form by assuming that all matter is made up of three primal substances, sulphur, mercury and salt. To these three constituents he ascribed more definite functions than had previously been recognized. Sulphur was the combustible principle, mercury that which imparts fusibility, liquidity and volatility, salt that which is nonvolatile and incombustible. This idea he developed extensively in very many of his works. Thus in the Paramirum ... 

Paracelsus believed that the material world was ultimately composed of the four Aristotelian elements of Earth, Air, Fire, and Water, but that more immediately it was made up of three substances. These were known as mercury, sulfur, and salt, and were sometimes referred to as the triaprima. They were not the actual substances that we know by these names today, but stood for certain principles. Mercury, also known as the spirit, stood for the principles of fusibility and volatility. Sulfur, which represented the soul, stood for inflammability, and salt, the body, stood for incombustibility and nonvolatility. In this theory Paracelsus had revived an old Arabic idea that metals were formed from a combination of sulfur and mercury. He added the third principle of salt, and extended the definition to include all material substances. 

He accepted the Aristotelian theory of the four elements, but he extended the sulfur-mercury theory and applied his theory to all substances, not just metals. He did this by adding a third basic constituent, salt, as Rhazes had done seven hundred years previously. For Paracelsus, salt represented the principle of incombustibility and non-volatility. This theory which became known as tria prima, referred to three basic qualities, not to ordinary mercury, sulfur, and salt ... 

In the alchemical worldview, Mercury refers to the mercurial quality of matter rather than to the element we now call mercury. The alchemists believed that metals differed from one another because they contained greater or lesser amounts of particular qualities. According to Paracelsus theory of tria prima, the three fundamental properties of matter were represented by mercury sulfur, and salt.22 Sulfur was associated with Sol, the sun, and thus with the Masculine Principle, while mercury was closely associated with silver, the Moon, and the Feminine Principle.23 Salt—the fixed, immutable, quality of matter—was associated with body and earth. 

---