The Space of Chemical Theory

Chemists inherited from the sixteenth century an odd mix of the Aristotelian elements and the Paracelsian principles. In attacking the scholastic philosophy, Paracelsus (1493-1541) had not abandoned the four elements, but he had introduced the tria prima of Salt, Sulphur, and Mercury without clarifying the relationship between the two systems. The French Paracelsians who taught at the Jardin were, on the 

Chemist by this same means has discovered his principles Mercury, Sulphur, Salt, seeing from experiment that Chemical artificial resolution could well arrive at these three principles. It would stop at these principles and not go beyond it. Otherwise, it could destroy totally the virtue of the resolved body. But then this would no longer be chemical resolution which always has to conserve the virtues of mixts stops at the principles which sustain them, in order not to go beyond its goal, which is to dissolve c coagulate the mixt without losing anything of its internal virtues.  

None of these principles appeared alone, however, as a simple substance. The fact that chemists could not make complete extractions and produce these principles in pure state rendered Beguin s theory somewhat uncertain. His three principles remained as yet ideal substances. 

The introductory part of the Tyrocinium also discussed the main operations and instruments of chemistry, the taxonomy of which changed little over the course of the seventeenth century. Chemical operations consisted of solution and coagulation. Beguin listed two main methods of solution calcination (solution in fire) and extraction (solution in menstruum). Calcination was a reduction of mixt into calx, which was called by Geber pulverization of compound made by fire. Calx consisted of a subtle powder, principally of minerals, made by the dissipation of the humidity that linked their parts. Extraction was a species of 

Etienne de Clave later produced a more systematic treatise in which he pointed out the shortcomings of the Paracelsian and Aristotelian philosophies on analytic grounds. He argued that a natural or physical principle had to be a simple and homogeneous body and therefore could not be compounded. Ideally, the elements of nature should be discovered through the resolution of mixts into their principles, which the Aristotelian theory did not prescribe. Furthermore, such resolution had to be an exact exquisite purification c the last or final reduction of 

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