Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Chapter 4c - The Alchymists



Jacob Böhmen

It is now time to speak of Jacob Böhmen, who thought he could
discover the secret of the transmutation of metals in the Bible,
and who invented a strange heterogeneous doctrine of mingled
alchymy and religion, and founded upon it the sect of the
Aurea-crucians. He was born at Görlitz, in Upper Lusatia, in 1575,
and followed till his thirtieth year the occupation of a
shoemaker. In this obscurity he remained, with the character of a
visionary and a man of unsettled mind, until the promulgation of
the Rosicrucian philosophy in his part of Germany, toward the year
1607 or 1608. From that time he began to neglect his leather, and
buried his brain under the rubbish of metaphysics. The works of
Paracelsus fell into his hands; and these, with the reveries of
the Rosicrucians, so completely engrossed his attention that be
abandoned his trade altogether, sinking, at the same time, from a
state of comparative independence into poverty and destitution.
But he was nothing daunted by the miseries and privations of the
flesh; his mind was fixed upon the beings of another sphere, and
in thought he was already the new apostle of the human race. In
the year 1612, after a meditation of four years, he published his
first work, entitled Aurora, or the Rising of the Sun; embodying
the ridiculous notions of Paracelsus, and worse confounding the
confusion of that writer. The philosopher's stone might, he
contended, be discovered by a diligent search of the Old and New
Testaments, and more especially of the Apocalypse, which alone
contained all the secrets of alchymy. He contended that the divine
grace operated by the same rules, and followed the same methods,
that the divine providence observed in the natural world; and that
the minds of men were purged from their vices and corruptions in
the very same manner that metals were purified from their dross,
namely, by fire.

Besides the sylphs, gnomes, undines, and salamanders, he
acknowledged various ranks and orders of demons. He pretended to
invisibility and absolute chastity. He also said that, if it
pleased him, he could abstain for years from meat and drink, and
all the necessities of the body. It is needless, however, to
pursue his follies any further. He was reprimanded for writing
this work by the magistrates of Görlitz, and commanded to leave
the pen alone and stick to his wax, that his family might not
become chargeable to the parish. He neglected this good advice,
and continued his studies; burning minerals and purifying metals
one day, and mystifying the Word of God on the next. He afterwards
wrote three other works, as sublimely ridiculous as the first. The
one was entitled Metallurgia, and has the slight merit of being
the least obscure of his compositions. Another was called The
Temporal Mirror of Eternity; and the last his Theosophy revealed,
full of allegories and metaphors,
"All strange and geason,
Devoid of sense and ordinary reason."

Böhmen died in 1624, leaving behind him a considerable number of
admiring disciples. Many of them became, during the seventeenth
century, as distinguished for absurdity as their master; amongst
whom may be mentioned Gifftheil, Wendenhagen, John Jacob
Zimmermann, and Abraham Frankenberg. Their heresy rendered them
obnoxious to the Church of Rome; and many of them suffered long
imprisonment and torture for their faith. One, named Kuhlmann, was
burned alive at Moscow, in 1684, on a charge of sorcery. Böhmen's
works were translated into English, and published, many years
afterwards, by an enthusiast named William Law.


Mormius

Peter Mormius, a notorious alchymist, and contemporary of Böhmen,
endeavoured, in 1630, to introduce the Rosicrucian philosophy into
Holland. He applied to the States-General to grant him a public
audience, that he might explain the tenets of the sect, and
disclose a plan for rendering Holland the happiest and richest
country on the earth, by means of the philosopher's' stone and the
service of the elementary spirits. The States-General wisely
resolved to have nothing to do with him. He thereupon determined
to shame them by printing his book, which he did at Leyden the
same year. It was entitled The Book of the most Hidden Secrets of
Nature, and was divided into three parts; the first treating of
"perpetual motion;" the second of the "transmutation of metals;"
and the third of the "universal medicine." He also published some
German works upon the Rosicrucian philosophy, at Frankfort, in
1617.

Poetry and romance are deeply indebted to the Rosicrucians for
many a graceful creation. The literature of England, France, and
Germany contains hundreds of sweet fictions, whose machinery has
been borrowed from their day-dreams. The "delicate Ariel" of
Shakspeare stands pre-eminent among the number. From the same
source Pope drew the airy tenants of Belinda's dressing-room, in
his charming Rape of the Lock; and La Motte Fouqué, the beautiful
and capricious water-nymph, Undine, around whom he has thrown more
grace and loveliness, and for whose imaginary woes he has excited
more sympathy, than ever were bestowed on a supernatural being.
Sir Walter Scott also endowed the White Lady of Avenel with many
of the attributes of the undines, or water-sprites. German romance
and lyrical poetry teem with allusions to sylphs, gnomes, undines,
and salamanders; and the French have not been behind in
substituting them, in works of fiction, for the more cumbrous
mythology of Greece and Rome. The sylphs, more especially, have
been the favourites of the bards, and have become so familiar to
the popular mind as to be, in a manner, confounded with that other
race of ideal beings, the fairies, who can boast of an antiquity
much more venerable in the annals of superstition. Having these
obligations to the Rosicrucians, no lover of poetry can wish,
however absurd they were, that such a sect of philosophers had
never existed.


Borri

Just at the time that Michael Mayer was making known to the world
the existence of such a body as the Rosicrucians, there was born
in Italy a man who was afterwards destined to become the most
conspicuous member of the fraternity. The alchymic mania never
called forth the ingenuity of a more consummate or more successful
impostor than Joseph Francis Borri. He was born in 1616 according
to some authorities, and in 1627 according to others, at Milan;
where his father, the Signor Branda Borri, practised as a
physician. At the age of sixteen, Joseph was sent to finish his
education at the Jesuits' college in Rome, where he distinguished
himself by his extraordinary memory. He learned every thing to
which he applied himself with the utmost ease. In the most
voluminous works no fact was too minute for his retention, and no
study was so abstruse but that he could master it; but any
advantages he might have derived from this facility were
neutralised by his ungovernable passions and his love of turmoil
and debauchery. He was involved in continual difficulty, as well
with the heads of the college as with the police of Rome, and
acquired so bad a character that years could not remove it. By the
aid of his friends he established himself as a physician in Rome,
and also obtained some situation in the pope's household. In one
of his fits of studiousness he grew enamoured of alchymy, and
determined to devote his energies to the discovery of the
philosopher's stone. Of unfortunate propensities he had quite
sufficient, besides this, to bring him to poverty. His pleasures
were as expensive as his studies, and both were of a nature to
destroy his health and ruin his fair fame. At the age of
thirty-seven he found that he could not live by the practice of
medicine, and began to look about for some other employment. He
became, in 1653, private secretary to the Marquis di Mirogli, the
minister of the Archduke of Innsprük at the court of Rome. He
continued in this capacity for two years; leading, however, the
same abandoned life as heretofore, frequenting the society of
gamesters, debauchees, and loose women, involving himself in
disgraceful street quarrels, and alienating the patrons who were
desirous to befriend him.

All at once a sudden change was observed in his conduct. The
abandoned rake put on the outward sedateness of a philosopher; the
scoffing sinner proclaimed that he had forsaken his evil ways, and
would live thenceforth a model of virtue. To his friends this
reformation was as pleasing as it was unexpected; and Borri gave
obscure hints that it had been brought about by some miraculous
manifestation of a superior power. He pretended that he held
converse with beneficent spirits; that the secrets of God and
nature were revealed to him; and that he had obtained possession
of the philosopher's stone. Like his predecessor, Jacob Böhmen, he
mixed up religious questions with his philosophical jargon, and
took measures for declaring himself the founder of a new sect.
This, at Rome itself, and in the very palace of the pope, was a
hazardous proceeding; and Borri just awoke to a sense of it in
time to save himself from the dungeons of the Castle of St.
Angelo. He fled to Innsprük, where he remained about a year, and
then returned to his native city of Milan.

The reputation of his great sanctity had gone before him; and he
found many persons ready to attach themselves to his fortunes. All
who were desirous of entering into the new communion took an oath
of poverty, and relinquished their possessions for the general
good of the fraternity. Borri told them that he had received from
the archangel Michael a heavenly sword, upon the hilt of which
were engraven the names of the seven celestial intelligences.
"Whoever shall refuse," said he, "to enter into my new sheepfold
shall be destroyed by the papal armies, of whom God has
predestined me to be the chief. To those who follow me, all joy
shall be granted. I shall soon bring my chemical studies to a
happy conclusion by the discovery of the philosopher's stone, and
by this means we shall all have as much gold as we desire. I am
assured of the aid of the angelic hosts, and more especially of
the archangel Michael's. When I began to walk in the way of the
spirit, I had a vision of the night, and was assured by an angelic
voice that I should become a prophet. In sign of it I saw a
palm-tree, surrounded with all the glory of paradise. The angels
come to me whenever I call, and reveal to me all the secrets of
the universe. The sylphs and elementary spirits obey me, and fly
to the uttermost ends of the world to serve me, and those whom I
delight to honour." By force of continually repeating such stories
as these, Borri soon found himself at the head of a very
considerable number of adherents. As he figures in these pages as
an alchymist, and not as a religious sectarian, it will be
unnecessary to repeat the doctrines which he taught with regard to
some of the dogmas of the Church of Rome, and which exposed him to
the fierce resentment of the papal authority. They were to the
full as ridiculous as his philosophical pretensions. As the number
of his followers increased, he appears to have cherished the idea
of becoming one day a new Mahomet, and of founding, in his native
city of Milan, a monarchy and religion of which he should be the
king and the prophet. He had taken measures, in the year 1658, for
seizing the guards at all the gates of that city, and formally
declaring himself the monarch of the Milanese. Just as he thought
the plan ripe for execution, it was discovered. Twenty of his
followers were arrested, and he himself managed, with the utmost
difficulty, to escape to the neutral territory of Switzerland,
where the papal displeasure could not reach him.

The trial of his followers commenced forthwith, and the whole of
them were sentenced to various terms of imprisonment. Borri's
trial proceeded in his absence, and lasted for upwards of two
years. He was condemned to death as a heretic and sorcerer in
1661, and was burned in effigy in Rome by the common hangman.

Borri, in the mean time, lived quietly in Switzerland, indulging
himself in railing at the Inquisition and its proceedings. He
afterwards went to Strasbourg, intending to fix his residence in
that town. He was received with great cordiality, as a man
persecuted for his religious opinions, and withal a great
alchymist. He found that sphere too narrow for his aspiring
genius, and retired in the same year to the more wealthy city 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 be 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 anything 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 Hamburgh.

On his arrival in that city, he found the celebrated Christina,
the ex-Queen of Sweden. He procured an introduction to her, and
requested her patronage in his endeavour to discover the
philosopher's stone. She gave him some encouragement; but Borri,
fearing that the merchants of Amsterdam, who had connexions in
Hamburgh, might expose his delinquencies if he remained in the
latter city, passed over to Copenhagen, and sought the protection
of Frederick III, the king of Denmark.

This prince was a firm believer in the transmutation of metals.
Being in want of money, he readily listened to the plans of an
adventurer who had both eloquence and ability to recommend him. He
provided Borri with the means to make experiments, and took a
great interest in the progress of his operations. He expected
every month to possess riches that would buy Peru; and, when he
was disappointed, accepted patiently the excuses of Borri who,
upon every failure, was always ready with some plausible
explanation. He became in time much attached to him; and defended
him from the jealous attacks of his courtiers, and the indignation
of those who were grieved to see their monarch the easy dupe of a
charlatan. Borri endeavoured, by every means in his power, to find
aliment for this good opinion. His knowledge of medicine was
useful to him in this respect, and often stood between him and
disgrace. He lived six years in this manner at the court of
Frederick; but that monarch dying in 1670 he was left without a
protector.

As he had made more enemies than friends in Copenhagen, and had
nothing to hope from the succeeding sovereign, he sought an asylum
in another country. He went first to Saxony; but met so little
encouragement, and encountered so much danger from the emissaries
of the Inquisition, that he did not remain there many months.
Anticipating nothing but persecution in every country that
acknowledged the spiritual authority of the pope, he appears to
have taken the resolution to dwell in Turkey, and turn Mussulman.
On his arrival at the Hungarian frontier, on his way to
Constantinople, he was arrested on suspicion of being concerned in
the conspiracy of the Counts Nadasdi and Frangipani, which had
just been discovered. In vain he protested his innocence, and
divulged his real name and profession. He was detained in prison,
and a letter despatched to the Emperor Leopold, to know what
should be done with him. The star of his fortunes was on the
decline. The letter reached Leopold at an unlucky moment. The
pope's nuncio was closeted with his majesty; and he no sooner
heard the name of Joseph Francis Borri, than he demanded him as a
prisoner of the Holy See. The request was complied with; and
Borri, closely manacled, was sent under an escort of soldiers to
the prison of the Inquisition at Rome. He was too much of an
impostor to be deeply tinged with fanaticism, and was not
unwilling to make a public recantation of his heresies, if he
could thereby save his life. When the proposition was made to him,
he accepted it with eagerness. His punishment was to be commuted
into the hardly less severe one of perpetual imprisonment; but he
was too happy to escape the clutch of the executioner at any
price, and he made the amende honorable in face of the assembled
multitudes of Rome on the 27th of October 1672. He was then
transferred to the prisons of the Castle of St. Angelo, where he
remained till his death, twenty-three years afterwards. It is said
that, towards the close of his life, considerable indulgence was
granted him; that he was allowed to have a laboratory, and to
cheer the solitude of his dungeon by searching for the
philosopher's stone. Queen Christina, during her residence at
Rome, frequently visited the old man, to converse with him upon
chemistry and the doctrines of the Rosicrucians. She even obtained
permission that he should leave his prison occasionally for a day
or two, and reside in her palace, she being responsible for his
return to captivity. She encouraged him to search for the great
secret of the alchymists, and provided him with money for the
purpose. It may well be supposed that Borri benefited most by this
acquaintance, and that Christina got nothing but experience. It is
not sure that she gained even that; for until her dying day, she
was convinced of the possibility of finding the philosopher's
stone, and ready to assist any adventurer either zealous or
impudent enough to pretend to it.

After Borri had been about eleven years in confinement, a small
volume was published at Cologne, entitled The Key of the Cabinet
of the Chevalier Joseph Francis Borri; in which are contained many
curious Letters upon Chemistry and other Sciences, written by him,
together with a Memoir of his Life. This book contained a complete
exposition of the Rosicrucian philosophy, and afforded materials
to the Abbé de Villars for his interesting Count de Gabalis, which
excited so much attention at the close of the seventeenth century.

Borri lingered in the prison of St. Angelo till 1695, when he died
in his eightieth year. Besides The Key of the Cabinet, written
originally in Copenhagen, in 1666, for the edification of King
Frederick III, he published a work upon alchymy and the secret
sciences, under the title of The Mission of Romulus to the Romans.


Inferior Alchymists of the Seventeenth Century

Besides the pretenders to the philosopher's stone whose lives have
been already narrated, this and the preceding century produced a
great number of writers, who inundated literature with their books
upon the subject. In fact, most of the learned men of that age had
some faith in it. Van Helmont, Borrichius, Kirchen, Boerhaave, and
a score of others, though not professed alchymists, were fond of
the science, and countenanced its professors. Helvetius, the
grandfather of the celebrated philosopher of the same name,
asserts that he saw an inferior metal turned into gold by a
stranger, at the Hague, in 1666. He says, that, sitting one day in
his study, a man, who was dressed as a respectable burgher of
North Holland, and very modest and simple in his appearance,
called upon him, with the intention of dispelling his doubts
relative to the philosopher's stone. He asked Helvetius if he
thought he should know that rare gem if he saw it. To which
Helvetius replied, that he certainly should not. The burgher
immediately drew from his pocket a small ivory box, containing
three pieces of metal, of the colour of brimstone, and extremely
heavy; and assured Helvetius, that of them he could make as much
as twenty tons of gold. Helvetius informs us, that he examined
them very attentively; and seeing that they were very brittle, he
took the opportunity to scrape off a very small portion with his
thumb-nail. He then returned them to the stranger, with an
entreaty that he would perform the process of transmutation before
him. The stranger replied, that he was not allowed to do so, and
went away. After his departure, Helvetius procured a crucible and
a portion of lead, into which, when in a state of fusion, he threw
the stolen grain from the philosopher's stone. He was disappointed
to find that the grain evaporated altogether, leaving the lead in
its original state.

Some weeks afterwards, when he had almost forgotten the subject,
he received another visit from the stranger. He again entreated
him to explain the processes by which he pretended to transmute
lead. The stranger at last consented, and informed him, that one
grain was sufficient; but that it was necessary to envelope it in
a ball of wax before throwing it on the molten metal; otherwise
its extreme volatility would cause it to go off in vapour. They
tried the experiment, and succeeded to their heart's content.
Helvetius repeated the experiment alone, and converted six ounces
of lead into very pure gold.

The fame of this event spread all over the Hague, and all the
notable persons of the town flocked to the study of Helvetius to
convince themselves of the fact. Helvetius performed the
experiment again, in the presence of the Prince of Orange, and
several times afterwards, until he exhausted the whole of the
powder he had received from the stranger, from whom it is
necessary to state, he never received another visit; nor did he
ever discover his name or condition. In the following year
Helvetius published his Golden Calf,36* in which he detailed the
above circumstances.

About the same time, the celebrated Father Kircher published his
Subterranean World, in which he called the alchymists a
congregation of knaves and impostors, and their science a
delusion. He admitted that he had himself been a diligent labourer
in the field, and had only come to this conclusion after mature
consideration and repeated fruitless experiments. All the
alchymists were in arms immediately, to refute this formidable
antagonist. One Solomon de Blauenstein was the first to grapple
with him, and attempted to convict him of wilful
misrepresentation, by recalling to his memory the transmutations
by Sendivogius, before the Emperor Frederick III and the Elector
of Mayence, all performed within a recent period. Zwelfer and
Glauber also entered into the dispute, and attributed the enmity
of Father Kircher to spite and jealousy against adepts who had
been more successful than himself.

It was also pretended that Gustavus Adolphus transmuted a quantity
of quicksilver into pure gold. The learned Borrichius relates,
that he saw coins which had been struck of this gold; and Lenglet
du Fresnoy deposes to the same circumstance. In the Travels of
Monconis the story is told in the following manner: "A merchant of
Lubeck, who carried on but little trade, but who knew how to
change lead into very good gold, gave the King of Sweden a lingot
which he had made, weighing at least one hundred pounds. The king
immediately caused it to be coined into ducats; and because he
knew positively that its origin was such as had been stated to
him, he had his own arms graven upon the one side, and
emblematical figures of Mercury and Venus on the other. I
(continued Monconis) have one of these ducats in my possession;
and was credibly informed that, after the death of the Lubeck
merchant, who had never appeared very rich, a sum of no less than
one million seven hundred thousand crowns was found in his
coffers."37*

Such stories as these, confidently related by men high in station,
tended to keep up the infatuation of the alchymists in every
country of Europe. It is astonishing to see the number of works
which were written upon the subject during the seventeenth century
alone, and the number of clever men who sacrificed themselves to
the delusion. Gabriel de Castaigne, a monk of the order of St.
Francis, attracted so much notice in the reign of Louis XIII, that
that monarch secured him in his household, and made him his Grand
Almoner. He pretended to find the elixir of life; and Louis
expected by his means to have enjoyed the crown for a century. Van
Helmont also pretended to have once performed with success the
process of transmuting quicksilver; and was in consequence invited
by the Emperor Rudolph II to fix his residence at the court of
Vienna. Glauber, the inventor of the salts which still bear his
name, and who practised as a physician at Amsterdam about the
middle of the seventeenth century, established a public school in
that city for the study of alchymy, and gave lectures himself upon
the science. John Joachim Becher of Spire acquired great
reputation at the same period; and was convinced that much gold
might be made out of flint-stones by a peculiar process, and the
aid of that grand and incomprehensible substance the philosopher's
stone. He made a proposition to the Emperor Leopold of Austria to
aid him in these experiments; but the hope of success was too
remote, and the present expense too great to tempt that monarch;
and he therefore gave Becher much of his praise, but none of his
money. Becher afterwards tried the States-General of Holland, with
no better success.

With regard to the innumerable tricks by which impostors persuaded
the world that they had succeeded in making gold, and of which so
many stories were current about this period, a very satisfactory
report was read by M. Geoffroy the elder, at the sitting of the
Royal Academy of Sciences, at Paris, on the 15th of April, 1722.
As it relates principally to the alchymic cheats of the sixteenth
and seventeenth centuries, the following abridgment of it may not
be out of place in this portion of our history. The instances of
successful transmutation were so numerous, and apparently so well
authenticated, that nothing short of so able an exposure as that
of M. Geoffroy could disabuse the public mind. The trick to which
they oftenest had recourse, was to use a double-bottomed crucible,
the under surface being of iron or copper, and the upper one of
wax, painted to resemble the same metal. Between the two they
placed as much gold or silver dust as was necessary for their
purpose. They then put in their lead, quicksilver, or other
ingredients, and placed their pot upon the fire. Of course, when
the experiment was concluded, they never failed to find a lump of
gold at the bottom. The same result was produced in many other
ways. Some of them used a hollow wand, filled with gold or silver
dust, and stopped at the ends with wax or butter. With this they
stirred the boiling metal in their crucibles, taking care to
accompany the operation with many ceremonies, to divert attention
from the real purpose of the manœuvre. They also drilled holes in
lumps of lead, into which they poured molten gold, and carefully
closed the aperture with the original metal. Sometimes they washed
a piece of gold with quicksilver. When in this state they found no
difficulty in palming it off upon the uninitiated as an inferior
metal, and very easily transmuted it into fine sonorous gold again
with the aid of a little aquafortis.

Others imposed by means of nails, half iron and half gold or
silver. They pretended that they really transmuted the precious
half from iron, by dipping it in a strong alcohol. M. Geoffroy
produced several of these nails to the Academy of Sciences, and
shewed how nicely the two parts were soldered together. The golden
or silver half was painted black to resemble iron, and the colour
immediately disappeared when the nail was dipped into aquafortis.
A nail of this description was, for a long time, in the cabinet of
the Grand Duke of Tuscany. Such also, said M. Geoffroy, was the
knife presented by a monk to Queen Elizabeth of England; the blade
of which was half gold and half steel. Nothing at one time was
more common than to see coins, half gold and half silver, which
had been operated upon by alchymists, for the same purposes of
trickery. In fact, says M. Geoffroy, in concluding his long
report, there is every reason to believe that all the famous
histories which have been handed down to us about the
transmutation of metals into gold or silver, by means of the
powder of projection or philosophical elixirs, are founded upon
some successful deception of the kind above narrated. These
pretended philosophers invariably disappeared after the first or
second experiment, or their powders or elixirs have failed to
produce their effect, either because attention being excited they
have found no opportunity to renew the trick without being
discovered, or because they have not had sufficient gold dust for
more than one trial.

The disinterestedness of these would-be philosophers looked, at
first sight, extremely imposing. Instances were not rare in which
they generously abandoned all the profits of their transmutations—
even the honour of the discovery! But this apparent
disinterestedness was one of the most cunning of their manœuvres.
It served to keep up the popular expectation; it seemed to shew
the possibility of discovering the philosopher's stone, and
provided the means of future advantages, which they were never
slow to lay hold of—such as entrances into royal households,
maintenance at the public expense, and gifts from ambitious
potentates, too greedy after the gold they so easily promised.

It now only remains to trace the progress of the delusion from the
commencement of the eighteenth century until the present day. It
will be seen that, until a very recent period, there were but
slight signs of a return to reason.


Jean Delisle

In the year 1705, there was much talk in France of a blacksmith,
named Delisle, who had discovered the philosopher's stone, and who
went about the country turning lead into gold. He was a native of
Provence, from which place his fame soon spread to the capital.
His early life is involved in obscurity; but Lenglet du Fresnoy
has industriously collected some particulars of his later career,
which possess considerable interest. He was a man without any
education, and had been servant in his youth to an alchymist, from
whom he learned many of the tricks of the fraternity. The name of
his master has never been discovered; but it is pretended that he
rendered himself in some manner obnoxious to the government of
Louis XIV, and was obliged, in consequence, to take refuge in
Switzerland. Delisle accompanied him as far as Savoy, and there,
it is said, set upon him in a solitary mountain-pass, and murdered
and robbed him. He then disguised himself as a pilgrim, and
returned to France. At a lonely inn, by the road-side, where he
stopped for the night, he became acquainted with a woman, named
Aluys; and so sudden a passion was enkindled betwixt them, that
she consented to leave all, follow him, and share his good or evil
fortune wherever he went. They lived together for five or six
years in Provence, without exciting any attention, apparently
possessed of a decent independence. At last, in 1706, it was given
out that he was the possessor of the philosopher's stone; and
people from far and near came flocking to his residence, at the
Château de la Palu, at Sylanez, near Barjaumont, to witness the
wealth he could make out of pumps and fire-shovels. The following
account of his operations is given in a letter addressed by M. de
Cerisy, the Prior of Châteauneuf, in the Diocese of Riez, in
Provence, to the Vicar of St. Jacques du Hautpas, at Paris, and
dated the 18th of November 1706:

"I have something to relate to you, my dear cousin, which will be
interesting to you and your friends. The philosopher's stone,
which so many persons have looked upon as a chimera, is at last
found. It is a man named Delisle, of the parish of Sylanez, and
residing within a quarter of a league of me, that has discovered
this great secret. He turns lead into gold, and iron into silver,
by merely heating these metals red hot, and pouring upon them in
that state some oil and powder he is possessed of; so that it
would not be impossible for any man to make a million a day, if he
had sufficient of this wondrous mixture. Some of the pale gold
which he had made in this manner, he sent to the jewellers of
Lyons, to have their opinion on its quality. He also sold twenty
pounds weight of it to a merchant of Digne, named Taxis. All the
jewellers say they never saw such fine gold in their lives. He
makes nails, part gold, part iron, and part silver. He promised to
give me one of them, in a long conversation which I had with him
the other day, by order of the Bishop of Senés, who saw his
operations with his own eyes, and detailed all the circumstances
to me.

"The Baron and Baroness de Rheinwald shewed me a lingot of gold
made out of pewter before their eyes by M. Delisle. My
brother-in-law Sauveur, who has wasted fifty years of his life in
this great study, brought me the other day a nail which he had
seen changed into gold by Delisle, and fully convinced me that all
his previous experiments were founded on an erroneous principle.
This excellent workman received, a short time ago, a very kind
letter from the superintendent of the royal household, which I
read. He offered to use all his influence with the ministers to
prevent any attempts upon his liberty, which has twice been
attacked by the agents of government. It is believed that the oil
he makes use of, is gold or silver reduced to that state. He
leaves it for a long time exposed to the rays of the sun. He told
me that it generally took him six months to make all his
preparations. I told him that, apparently, the king wanted to see
him. He replied that he could not exercise his art in every place,
as a certain climate and temperature were absolutely necessary to
his success. The truth is, that this man appears to have no
ambition. He only keeps two horses and two men-servants. Besides,
he loves his liberty, has no politeness, and speaks very bad
French; but his judgment seems to be solid. He was formerly no
more than a blacksmith, but excelled in that trade without having
been taught it. All the great lords and seigneurs from far and
near come to visit him, and pay such court to him, that it seems
more like idolatry than anything else. Happy would France be if
this man would discover his secret to the king, to whom the
superintendent has already sent some lingots! But the happiness is
too great to be hoped for; for I fear that the workman and his
secret will expire together. There is no doubt that this discovery
will make a great noise in the kingdom, unless the character of
the man, which I have just depicted to you, prevent it. At all
events, posterity will hear of him."

In another letter to the same person, dated the 27th of January
1707, M. de Cerisy says, "My dear cousin, I spoke to you in my
last letter of the famous alchymist of Provence, M. Delisle. A
good deal of that was only hearsay, but now I am enabled to speak
from my own experience. I have in my possession a nail, half iron
and half silver, which I made myself. That great and admirable
workman also bestowed a still greater privilege upon me—he allowed
me turn a piece of lead which I had brought with me into pure
gold, by means of his wonderful oil and powder. All the country
have their eyes upon this gentleman; some deny loudly, others are
incredulous; but those who have seen acknowledge the truth. I have
read the passport that has been sent to him from court, with
orders that he should present himself at Paris early in the
spring. He told me that he would go willingly, and that it was
himself who fixed the spring for his departure; as he wanted to
collect his materials, in order that, immediately on his
introduction to the king, he might make an experiment worthy of
his majesty, by converting a large quantity of lead into the
finest gold. I sincerely hope that he will not allow his secret to
die with him, but that he will communicate it to the king. As I
had the honour to dine with him on Thursday last, the 20th of this
month, being seated at his side, I told him in a whisper that he
could, if he liked, humble all the enemies of France. He did not
deny it, but began to smile. In fact, this man is the miracle of
art. Sometimes he employs the oil and powder mixed, sometimes the
powder only; but in so small a quantity that, when the lingot
which I made was rubbed all over with it, it did not shew at all."

This soft-headed priest was by no means the only person in the
neighbourhood who lost his wits in hopes of the boundless wealth
held out by this clever impostor. Another priest, named De Lions,
a chanter in the cathedral of Grenoble, writing on the 30th
January 1707, says, "M. Mesnard, the curate of Montier, has
written to me, stating that there is a man, about thirty-five
years of age, named Delisle, who turns lead and iron into gold and
silver; and that this transmutation is so veritable and so true,
that the goldsmiths affirm that his gold and silver are the purest
and finest they ever saw. For five years this man was looked upon
as a madman or a cheat; but the public mind is now disabused with
respect to him. He now resides with M. de la Palu, at the château
of the same name. M. de la Palu is not very easy in his
circumstances, and wants money to portion his daughters, who have
remained single till middle age, no man being willing to take them
without a dowry. M. Delisle has promised to make them the richest
girls in the province before he goes to court, having been sent
for by the king. He has asked for a little time before his
departure, in order that he may collect powder enough to make
several quintals of gold before the eyes of his majesty, to whom
he intends to present them. The principal matter of his wonderful
powder is composed of simples, principally the herbs Lunaria major
and minor. There is a good deal of the first planted by him in the
gardens of La Palu; and he gets the other from the mountains that
stretch about two leagues from Montier. What I tell you now is not
a mere story invented for your diversion: M. Mesnard can bring
forward many witnesses to its truth; among others, the Bishop of
Senés, who saw these surprising operations performed; and M. de
Cerisy, whom you know well. Delisle transmutes his metals in
public. He rubs the lead or iron with his powder, and puts it over
burning charcoal. In a short time it changes colour; the lead
becomes yellow, and is found to be converted into excellent gold:
the iron becomes white, and is found to be pure silver. Delisle is
altogether an illiterate person. M. de St. Auban endeavoured to
teach him to read and write, but he profited very little by his
lessons. He is unpolite, fantastic, and a dreamer, and acts by
fits and starts."

Delisle, it would appear, was afraid of venturing to Paris. He
knew that his sleight of hand would be too narrowly watched in the
royal presence; and upon some pretence or other, he delayed the
journey for more than two years. Desmarets, the Minister of
Finance to Louis XIV, thinking the "philosopher" dreaded foul
play, twice sent him a safe conduct under the king's seal; but
Delisle still refused. Upon this, Desmarets wrote to the Bishop of
Senés for his real opinion as to these famous transmutations. The
following was the answer of that prelate:

"Copy of a report addressed to M. Desmarets, Comptroller-General
of the Finances to His Majesty Louis XIV, by the Bishop of Senés,
dated March 1709.

"SIR,—"A twelvemonth ago, or a little more, I expressed to you my
joy at hearing of your elevation to the ministry; I have now the
honour to write you my opinion of the Sieur Delisle, who has been
working at the transmutation of metals in my diocese. I have,
during the last two years, spoken of him several times to the
Count de Pontchartrain, because he asked me; but I have not
written to you, sir, or to M. de Chamillart, because you neither
of you requested my opinion upon the subject. Now, however, that
you have given me to understand that you wish to know my
sentiments on the matter, I will unfold myself to you in all
sincerity, for the interests of the king and the glory of your
ministry.

"There are two things about the Sieur Delisle which, in my
opinion, should be examined without prejudice: the one relates to
his secret; the other, to his person; that is to say, whether his
transmutations are real, and whether his conduct has been regular.
As regards the secret of the philosopher's stone, I deemed it
impossible, for a long time; and for more than three years I was
more mistrustful of the pretensions of this Sieur Delisle than of
any other person. During this period I afforded him no
countenance; I even aided a person, who was highly recommended to
me by an influential family of this province, to prosecute Delisle
for some offence or other which it was alleged he had committed.
But this person, in his anger against him, having told me that he
had himself been several times the bearer of gold and silver to
the goldsmiths of Nice, Aix, and Avignon, which had been
transmuted by Delisle from lead and iron, I began to waver a
little in my opinions respecting him. I afterwards met Delisle at
the house of one of my friends. To please me, the family asked
Delisle to operate before me, to which he immediately consented. I
offered him some iron nails, which he changed into silver in the
chimney-place before six or seven credible witnesses. I took the
nails thus transmuted, and sent them by my almoner to Imbert, the
jeweller of Aix, who, having subjected them to the necessary
trial, returned them to me, saying they were very good silver.
Still, however, I was not quite satisfied. M. de Pontchartrain
having hinted to me, two years previously, that I should do a
thing agreeable to his majesty if I examined into this business of
Delisle, I resolved to do so now. I therefore summoned the
alchymist to come to me at Castellane. He came; and I had him
escorted by eight or ten vigilant men, to whom I had given notice
to watch his hands strictly. Before all of us he changed two
pieces of lead into gold and silver. I sent them both to M. de
Pontchartrain; and he afterwards informed me by a letter, now
lying before me, that he had shewn them to the most experienced
goldsmiths of Paris, who unanimously pronounced them to be gold
and silver of the very purest quality, and without alloy. My
former bad opinion of Delisle was now indeed shaken. It was much
more so when he performed transmutation five or six times before
me at Senés, and made me perform it myself before him without his
putting his hand to anything. You have seen, sir, the letter of my
nephew, the Père Berard, of the Oratoire at Paris, on the
experiment that he performed at Castellane, and the truth of which
I hereby attest. Another nephew of mine, the Sieur Bourget, who
was here three weeks ago, performed the same experiment in my
presence, and will detail all the circumstances to you personally
at Paris. A hundred persons in my diocese have been witnesses of
these things. I confess to you, sir, that, after the testimony of
so many spectators and so many goldsmiths, and after the
repeatedly successful experiments that I saw performed, all my
prejudices vanished. My reason was convinced by my eyes; and the
phantoms of impossibility which I had conjured up were dissipated
by the work of my own hands.

"It now only remains for me to speak to you on the subject of his
person and conduct. Three suspicions have been excited against
him: the first, that he was implicated in some criminal proceeding
at Cisteron, and that he falsified the coin of the realm; the
second, that the king sent him two safe-conducts without effect;
and the third, that he still delays going to court to operate
before the king. You may see, sir, that I do not hide or avoid
anything. As regards the business at Cisteron, the Sieur Delisle
has repeatedly assured me that there was nothing against him which
could reasonably draw him within the pale of justice, and that he
had never carried on any calling injurious to the king's service.
It was true that, six or seven years ago, he had been to Cisteron
to gather herbs necessary for his powder, and that he had lodged
at the house of one Pelouse, whom he thought an honest man.
Pelouse was accused of clipping Louis-d'ors; and as he had lodged
with him, he was suspected of being his accomplice. This mere
suspicion, without any proof whatever, had caused him to be
condemned for contumacy; a common case enough with judges, who
always proceed with much rigour against those who are absent.
During my own sojourn at Aix, it was well known that a man, named
André Aluys, had spread about reports injurious to the character
of Delisle, because he hoped thereby to avoid paying him a sum of
forty Louis that he owed him. But permit me, sir, to go further,
and to add that, even if there were well-founded supicions against
Delisle, we should look with some little indulgence on the faults
of a man who possesses a secret so useful to the state. As regards
the two safe-conducts sent him by the king, I think I can answer
certainly that it was through no fault of his that he paid so
little attention to them. His year, strictly speaking, consists
only of the four summer months; and when by any means he is
prevented from making the proper use of them, he loses a whole
year. Thus the first safe-conduct became useless by the irruption
of the Duke of Savoy in 1707; and the second had hardly been
obtained, at the end of June 1708, when the said Delisle was
insulted by a party of armed men, pretending to act under the
authority of the Count de Grignan, to whom he wrote several
letters of complaint, without receiving any answer, or promise
that his safety would be attended to. What I have now told you,
sir, removes the third objection, and is the reason why, at the
present time, he cannot go to Paris to the king, in fulfilment of
his promises made two years ago. Two, or even three, summers have
been lost to him, owing to the continual inquietude he has
laboured under. He has, in consequence, been unable to work, and
has not collected a sufficient quantity of his oil and powder, or
brought what he has got to the necessary degree of perfection. For
this reason also he could not give the Sieur de Bourget the
portion he promised him for your inspection. If the other day he
changed some lead into gold with a few grains of his powder, they
were assuredly all he had; for he told me that such was the fact
long before he knew my nephew was coming. Even if he had preserved
this small quantity to operate before the king, I am sure that, on
second thoughts, he would never have adventured with so little;
because the slightest obstacles in the metals (their being too
hard or too soft, which is only discovered in operating,) would
have caused him to be looked upon as an impostor, if, in case his
first powder had proved ineffectual, he had not been possessed of
more to renew the experiment and surmount the difficulty.

"Permit me, sir, in conclusion, to repeat that such an artist as
this should not be driven to the last extremity, nor forced to
seek an asylum offered to him in other countries, but which he has
despised, as much from his own inclinations as from the advice I
have given him. You risk nothing in giving him a little time, and
in hurrying him you may lose a great deal. The genuineness of his
gold can no longer be doubted, after the testimony of so many
jewellers of Aix, Lyons, and Paris in its favour. As it is not his
fault that the previous safe-conducts sent to him have been of no
service, it will be necessary to send him another; for the success
of which I will be answerable, if you will confide the matter to
me, and trust to my zeal for the service of his majesty, to whom I
pray you to communicate this letter, that I may be spared the just
reproaches he might one day heap upon me if he remained ignorant
of the facts I have now written to you. Assure him, if you please,
that, if you send me such a safe-conduct, I will oblige the Sieur
Delisle to depose with me such precious pledges of his fidelity,
as shall enable me to be responsible myself to the king. These are
my sentiments, and I submit them to your superior knowledge; and
have the honour to remain, with much respect, &c."

 JOHN BISHOP OF SENÉS.

"To M. Desmarets, Minister of State, and
Comptroller-General of the Finances, at Paris."

That Delisle was no ordinary impostor, but a man of consummate
cunning and address, is very evident from this letter. The bishop
was fairly taken in by his clever legerdemain, and when once his
first distrust was conquered, appeared as anxious to deceive
himself as even Delisle could have wished. His faith was so
abundant that he made the case of his protégé his own, and would
not suffer the breath of suspicion to be directed against him.
Both Louis and his minister appear to have been dazzled by the
brilliant hopes he had excited, and a third pass, or safe-conduct,
was immediately sent to the alchymist, with a command from the
king that he should forthwith present himself at Versailles, and
make public trial of his oil and powder. But this did not suit the
plans of Delisle. In the provinces he was regarded as a man of no
small importance; the servile flattery that awaited him wherever
he went was so grateful to his mind that he could not willingly
relinquish it and run upon certain detection at the court of the
monarch. Upon one pretext or another he delayed his journey,
notwithstanding the earnest solicitations of his good friend the
bishop. The latter had given his word to the minister, and pledged
his honour that he would induce Delisle to go, and he began to be
alarmed when he found he could not subdue the obstinacy of that
individual. For more than two years he continued to remonstrate
with him, and was always met by some excuse, that there was not
sufficient powder, or that it had not been long enough exposed to
the rays of the sun. At last his patience was exhausted; and
fearful that he might suffer in the royal estimation by longer
delay, he wrote to the king for a lettre de cachet, in virtue of
which the alchymist was seized at the castle of La Palu, in the
month of June 1711, and carried off to be imprisoned in the
Bastille.

The gendarmes were aware that their prisoner was supposed to be
the lucky possessor of the philosopher's stone, and on the road
they conspired to rob and murder him. One of them pretended to be
touched with pity for the misfortunes of the philosopher, and
offered to give him an opportunity of escape whenever he could
divert the attention of his companions. Delisle was profuse in his
thanks, little dreaming of the snare that was laid for him. His
treacherous friend gave notice of the success of the stratagem so
far; and it was agreed that Delisle should be allowed to struggle
with and overthrow one of them while the rest were at some
distance. They were then to pursue him and shoot him through the
heart; and after robbing the corpse of the philosopher's stone,
convey it to Paris on a cart, and tell M. Desmarets that the
prisoner had attempted to escape, and would have succeeded, if
they had not fired after him and shot him through the body. At a
convenient place the scheme was executed. At a given signal from
the friendly gendarme Delisle fled, while another gendarme took
aim and shot him through the thigh. Some peasants arriving at the
instant, they were prevented from killing him as they intended;
and he was transported to Paris, maimed and bleeding. He was
thrown into a dungeon in the Bastille, and obstinately tore away
the bandages which the surgeons applied to his wound. He never
afterwards rose from his bed.

The Bishop of Senés visited him in prison, and promised him his
liberty if he would transmute a certain quantity of lead into gold
before the king. The unhappy man had no longer the means of
carrying on the deception; he had no gold, and no double-bottomed
crucible or hollow wand to conceal it in, even if he had. He would
not, however, confess that he was an impostor; but merely said he
did not know how to make the powder of projection, but had
received a quantity from an Italian philosopher, and had used it
all in his various transmutations in Provence. He lingered for
seven or eight months in the Bastille, and died from the effects
of his wound, in the forty-first year of his age.


Albert Aluys

This pretender to the philosopher's stone was the son, by a former
husband, of the woman Aluys, with whom Delisle became acquainted
at the commencement of his career, in the cabaret by the
road-side, and whom he afterwards married. Delisle performed the
part of a father towards him, and thought he could shew no
stronger proof of his regard, than by giving him the necessary
instructions to carry on the deception which had raised himself to
such a pitch of greatness. The young Aluys was an apt scholar, and
soon mastered all the jargon of the alchymists. He discoursed
learnedly upon projections, cimentations, sublimations, the elixir
of life, and the universal alkahest; and on the death of Delisle
gave out that the secret of that great adept had been communicated
to him, and to him only. His mother aided in the fraud, with the
hope they might both fasten themselves, in the true alchymical
fashion, upon some rich dupe, who would entertain them
magnificently while the operation was in progress. The fate of
Delisle was no inducement for them to stop in France. The
Provençals, it is true, entertained as high an opinion as ever of
his skill, and were well inclined to believe the tales of the
young adept on whom his mantle had fallen; but the dungeons of the
Bastille were yawning for their prey, and Aluys and his mother
decamped with all convenient expedition. They travelled about the
Continent for several years, sponging upon credulous rich men, and
now and then performing successful transmutations by the aid of
double-bottomed crucibles and the like. In the year 1726, Aluys,
without his mother, who appears to have died in the interval, was
at Vienna, where he introduced himself to the Duke de Richelieu,
at that time ambassador from the court of France. He completely
deceived this nobleman; he turned lead into gold (apparently) on
several occasions, and even made the ambassador himself turn an
iron nail into a silver one. The duke afterwards boasted to
Lenglet du Fresnoy of his achievements as an alchymist, and
regretted that he had not been able to discover the secret of the
precious powder by which he performed them.

Aluys soon found that, although he might make a dupe of the Duke
de Richelieu, he could not get any money from him. On the
contrary, the duke expected all his pokers and fire-shovels to be
made silver, and all his pewter utensils gold; and thought the
honour of his acquaintance was reward sufficient for a roturier,
who could not want wealth since he possessed so invaluable a
secret. Aluys, seeing that so much was expected of him, bade adieu
to his excellency, and proceeded to Bohemia, accompanied by a
pupil, and by a young girl who had fallen in love with him in
Vienna. Some noblemen in Bohemia received him kindly, and
entertained him at their houses for months at a time. It was his
usual practice to pretend that he possessed only a few grains of
his powder, with which he would operate in any house where he
intended to fix his quarters for the season. He would make the
proprietor a present of the piece of gold thus transmuted, and
promise him millions, if he could only be provided with leisure to
gather his lunaria major and minor on their mountain-tops, and
board, lodging, and loose cash for himself, his wife, and his
pupil in the interval.

He exhausted in this manner the patience of some dozen of people,
when, thinking that there was less danger for him in France under
the young king Louis XV than under his old and morose predecessor,
he returned to Provence. On his arrival at Aix, he presented
himself before M. le Bret, the president of the province, a
gentleman who was much attached to the pursuits of alchymy, and
had great hopes of being himself able to find the philosopher's
stone. M. le Bret, contrary to his expectation, received him very
coolly, in consequence of some rumours that were spread abroad
respecting him; and told him to call upon him on the morrow. Aluys
did not like the tone of the voice, or the expression of the eye
of the learned president, as that functionary looked down upon
him. Suspecting that all was not right, he left Aix secretly the
same evening, and proceeded to Marseilles. But the police were on
the watch for him; and he had not been there four-and-twenty
hours, before he was arrested on a charge of coining, and thrown
into prison.

As the proofs against him were too convincing to leave him much
hope of an acquittal, he planned an escape from durance. It so
happened that the gaoler had a pretty daughter, and Aluys soon
discovered that she was tender-hearted. He deavoured to gain her
in his favour, and succeeded. The damsel, unaware that he was a
married man, conceived and encouraged a passion for him, and
generously provided him with the means of escape. After he had
been nearly a year in prison he succeeded in getting free, leaving
the poor girl behind to learn that he was already married, and to
lament in solitude that she had given her heart to an ungrateful
vagabond.

When he left Marseilles, he had not a shoe to his foot or a decent
garment to his back, but was provided with some money and clothes
by his wife in a neighbouring town. They then found their way to
Brussels, and by dint of excessive impudence, brought themselves
into notice. He took a house, fitted up a splendid laboratory, and
gave out that he knew the secret of transmutation. In vain did M.
Percel, the brother-in-law of Lenglet du Fresnoy, who resided in
that city, expose his pretensions, and hold him up to contempt as
an ignorant impostor: the world believed him not. They took the
alchymist at his word, and besieged his doors to see and wonder at
the clever legerdemain by which he turned iron nails into gold and
silver. A rich greffier paid him a large sum of money that he
might be instructed in the art, and Aluys gave him several lessons
on the most common principles of chemistry. The greffier studied
hard for a twelvemonth, and then discovered that his master was a
quack. He demanded his money back again; but Aluys was not
inclined to give it him, and the affair was brought before the
civil tribunal of the province. In the mean time, however, the
greffier died suddenly; poisoned, according to the popular rumour,
by his debtor, to avoid repayment. So great an outcry arose in the
city, that Aluys, who may have been innocent of the crime, was
nevertheless afraid to remain and brave it. He withdrew secretly
in the night, and retired to Paris. Here all trace of him is lost.
He was never heard of again; but Lenglet du Fresnoy conjectures
that he ended his days in some obscure dungeon, into which he was
cast for coining or other malpractices.


The Count de St. Germain

This adventurer was of a higher grade than the last, and played a
distinguished part at the court of Louis XV. He pretended to have
discovered the elixir of life, by means of which he could make any
one live for centuries; and allowed it to be believed that his own
age was upwards of two thousand years. He entertained many of the
opinions of the Rosicrucians; boasted of his intercourse with
sylphs and salamanders; and of his power of drawing diamonds from
the earth, and pearls from the sea, by the force of his
incantations. He did not lay claim to the merit of having
discovered the philosopher's stone; but devoted so much of his
time to the operations of alchymy, that it was very generally
believed, that if such a thing as the philosopher's stone had ever
existed, or could be called into existence, he was the man to
succeed in finding it.

It has never yet been discovered what was his real name, or in
what country he was born. Some believed, from the Jewish cast of
his handsome countenance, that he was the "wandering Jew;" others
asserted that he was the issue of an Arabian princess, and that
his father was a salamander; while others, more reasonable,
affirmed him to be the son of a Portuguese Jew established at
Bourdeaux. He first carried on his imposture in Germany, where he
made considerable sums by selling an elixir to arrest the progress
of old age. The Maréchal de Belle-Isle purchased a dose of it; and
was so captivated with the wit, learning, and good manners of the
charlatan, and so convinced of the justice of his most
preposterous pretensions, that he induced him to fix his residence
in Paris. Under the marshal's patronage, he first appeared in the
gay circles of that capital. Every one was delighted with the
mysterious stranger; who, at this period of his life, appears to
have been about seventy years of age, but did not look more than
forty-five. His easy assurance imposed upon most people. His
reading was extensive, and his memory extraordinarily tenacious of
the slightest circumstances. His pretension to have lived for so
many centuries naturally exposed him to some puzzling questions,
as to the appearance, life, and conversation of the great men of
former days; but he was never at a loss for an answer. Many who
questioned him for the purpose of scoffing at him, refrained in
perplexity, quite bewildered by his presence of mind, his ready
replies, and his astonishing accuracy on every point mentioned in
history. To increase the mystery by which he was surrounded, he
permitted no person to know how he lived. He dressed in a style of
the greatest magnificence; sported valuable diamonds in his hat,
on his fingers, and in his shoe-buckles; and sometimes made the
most costly presents to the ladies of the court. It was suspected
by many that he was a spy, in the pay of the English ministry; but
there never was a tittle of evidence to support the charge. The
king looked upon him with marked favour, was often closeted with
him for hours together, and would not suffer any body to speak
disparagingly of him. Voltaire constantly turned him into
ridicule; and, in one of his letters to the King of Prussia,
mentions him as "un comte pour rire;" and states, that he
pretended to have dined with the holy fathers at the Council of
Trent!

In the Memoirs of Madame du Hausset, chamber-woman to Madame du
Pompadour, there are some amusing anecdotes of this personage.
Very soon after his arrival in Paris, he had the entrée of her
dressing-room; a favour only granted to the most powerful lords at
the court of her royal lover. Madame was fond of conversing with
him; and, in her presence, he thought fit to lower his pretensions
very considerably: but he often allowed her to believe that he had
lived two or three hundred years, at least. "One day," says Madame
du Hausset, "madame said to him, in my presence, 'What was the
personal appearance of Francis I? He was a king I should have
liked.' 'He was, indeed, very captivating,' replied St. Germain;
and he proceeded to describe his face and person, as that of a man
whom he had accurately observed. 'It is a pity he was too ardent.
I could have given him some good advice, which would have saved
him from all his misfortunes: but he would not have followed it;
for it seems as if a fatality attended princes, forcing them to
shut their ears to the wisest counsel.' 'Was his court very
brilliant?' inquired Madame du Pompadour. 'Very,' replied the
Count; 'but those of his grandsons surpassed it. In the time of
Mary Stuart and Margaret of Valois, it was a land of enchantment—a
temple sacred to pleasures of every kind.' Madame said, laughing,
'You seem to have seen all this.' 'I have an excellent memory,'
said he, 'and have read the history of France with great care. I
sometimes amuse myself, not by making, but by letting, it be
believed that I lived in old times.'

" 'But you do not tell us your age,' said Madame du Pompadour to
him on another occasion; 'and yet you pretend you are very old.
The Countess de Gergy, who was, I believe, ambassadress at Vienna
some fifty years ago, says she saw you there, exactly the same as
you now appear.'

" 'It is true, madam,' replied St. Germain; 'I knew Madame de
Gergy many years ago.'

" 'But, according to her account, you must be more than a hundred
years old?'

" 'That is not impossible,' said he, laughing; 'but it is much
more possible that the good lady is in her dotage.'

" 'You gave her an elixir, surprising for the effects it produced;
for she says, that during a length of time, she only appeared to
be eighty-four; the age at which she took it. Why don't you give
it to the king?'

" 'Oh, Madam!' he exclaimed, 'the physicians would have me broken
on the wheel, were I to think of drugging his majesty.' "

When the world begins to believe extraordinary things of an
individual, there is no telling where its extravagance will stop.
People, when once they have taken the start, vie with each other
who shall believe most. At this period all Paris resounded with
the wonderful adventures of the Count de St. Germain; and a
company of waggish young men tried the following experiment upon
its credulity: A clever mimic, who, on account of the amusement he
afforded, was admitted into good society, was taken by them,
dressed as the Count de St. Germain, into several houses in the
Rue du Marais. He imitated the count's peculiarities admirably,
and found his auditors open-mouthed to believe any absurdity he
chose to utter. No fiction was too monstrous for their
all-devouring credulity. He spoke of the Saviour of the world in
terms of the greatest familiarity; said he had supped with him at
the marriage in Canaan of Galilee, where the water was
miraculously turned into wine. In fact, he said he was an intimate
friend of his, and had often warned him to be less romantic and
imprudent, or he would finish his career miserably. This infamous
blasphemy, strange to say, found believers; and, ere three days
had elapsed, it was currently reported that St. Germain was born
soon after the deluge, and that he would never die!

St. Germain himself was too much a man of the world to assert
anything so monstrous; but he took no pains to contradict the
story. In all his conversations with persons of rank and
education, he advanced his claims modestly, and as if by mere
inadvertency, and seldom pretended to a longevity beyond three
hundred years; except when he found he was in company with persons
who would believe any thing. He often spoke of Henry VIII as if he
had known him intimately and of the Emperor Charles V as if that
monarch had delighted in his society. He would describe
conversations which took place with such an apparent truthfulness,
and be so exceedingly minute and particular as to the dress and
appearance of the individuals, and even the weather at the time,
and the furniture of the room, that three persons out of four were
generally inclined to credit him. He had constant applications
from rich old women for an elixir to make them young again; and,
it would appear, gained large sums in this manner. To those whom
he was pleased to call his friends he said his mode of living and
plan of diet were far superior to any elixir; and that any body
might attain a patriarchal age by refraining from drinking at
meals, and very sparingly at any other time. The Baron de Gleichen
followed this system, and took great quantities of senna leaves,
expecting to live for two hundred years. He died, however, at
seventy-three. The Duchess de Choiseul was desirous of following
the same system, but the duke her husband in much wrath forbade
her to follow any system prescribed by a man who had so equivocal
a reputation as M. de St. Germain.

Madame du Hausset says she saw St. Germain and conversed with him
several times. He appeared to her to be about fifty years of age,
was of the middle size, and had fine expressive features. His
dress was always simple, but displayed much taste. He usually wore
diamond rings of great value; and his watch and snuff-box were
ornamented with a profusion of precious stones. One day, at Madame
du Pompadour's apartments, where the principal courtiers were
assembled, St. Germain made his appearance in diamond knee and
shoe buckles of so fine a water, that madame said she did not
think the king had any equal to them. He was entreated to pass
into the antechamber and undo them; which he did, and brought them
to madame for closer inspection. M. de Gontant, who was present,
said their value could not be less than two hundred thousand
livres, or upwards of eight thousand pounds sterling. The Baron de
Gleichen, in his Memoirs, relates that the count one day shewed
him so many diamonds, that he thought he saw before him all the
treasures of Aladdin's lamp; and adds, that he had had great
experience in precious stones, and was convinced that all those
possessed by the count were genuine. On another occasion St.
Germain shewed Madame du Pompadour a small box, containing
topazes, emeralds, and diamonds worth half a million of livres. He
affected to despise all this wealth, to make the world more easily
believe that he could, like the Rosicrucians, draw precious stones
out of the earth by the magic of his song. He gave away a great
number of these jewels to the ladies of the court; and Madame du
Pompadour was so charmed with his generosity, that she gave him a
richly-enamelled snuff-box, as a token of her regard, on the lid
of which was beautifully painted a portrait of Socrates, or some
other Greek sage, to whom she compared him. He was not only lavish
to the mistresses, but to the maids. Madame du Hausset says, "The
count came to see Madame du Pompadour, who was very ill, and lay
on the sofa. He shewed her diamonds enough to furnish a king's
treasury. Madame sent for me to see all those beautiful things. I
looked at them with an air of the utmost astonishment; but I made
signs to her, that I thought them all false. The count felt for
something in a pocket-book about twice as large as a
spectacle-case, and at length drew out two or three little paper
packets, which he unfolded, and exhibited a superb ruby. He threw
on the table, with a contemptuous air, a little cross of green and
white stones. I looked at it, and said it was not to be despised.
I then put it on, and admired it greatly. The count begged me to
accept it; I refused. He urged me to take it. At length he pressed
so warmly, that madame, seeing it could not be worth more than a
thousand livres, made me a sign to accept it. I took the cross,
much pleased with the count's politeness."

How the adventurer obtained his wealth remains a secret. He could
not have made it all by the sale of his elixir vitæ in Germany;
though no doubt some portion of it was derived from that source.
Voltaire positively says he was in the pay of foreign governments;
and in his letter to the King of Prussia, dated the 5th of April
1758, says, that he was initiated in all the secrets of Choiseul,
Kaunitz, and Pitt. Of what use he could be to any of those
ministers, and to Choiseul especially, is a mystery of mysteries.

There appears no doubt that he possessed the secret of removing
spots from diamonds; and in all probability he gained considerable
sums by buying at inferior prices such as had flaws in them, and
afterwards disposing of them at a profit of cent per cent. Madame
du Hausset relates the following anecdote on this particular: "The
king," says she, "ordered a middling-sized diamond, which had a
flaw in it, to be brought to him. After having it weighed, his
majesty said to the count, 'The value of this diamond as it is,
and with the flaw in it, is six thousand livres; without the flaw,
it would be worth at least ten thousand. Will you undertake to
make me a gainer of four thousand livres?' St. Germain examined it
very attentively, and said, 'It is possible; it may be done. I
will bring it you again in a month.' At the time appointed, the
count brought back the diamond, without a spot, and gave it to the
king. It was wrapped in a cloth of amianthos, which he took off.
The king had it weighed immediately, and found it very little
diminished. His majesty then sent it to his jeweller by M. de
Gontant, without telling him of any thing that had passed. The
jeweller gave nine thousand six hundred livres for it. The king,
however, sent for the diamond back again, and said he would keep
it as a curiosity. He could not overcome his surprise, and said M.
de St. Germain must be worth millions, especially if he possessed
the secret of making large diamonds out of small ones. The count
neither said that he could or could not, but positively asserted
that he knew how to make pearls grow, and give them the finest
water. The king paid him great attention, and so did Madame du
Pompadour. M. du Quesnoy once said that St. Germain was a quack,
but the king reprimanded him. In fact, his majesty appears
infatuated by him, and sometimes talks of him as if his descent
were illustrious."

St. Germain had a most amusing vagabond for a servant, to whom he
would often appeal for corrobation, when relating some wonderful
event that happened centuries before. The fellow, who was not
without ability, generally corroborated him in a most satisfactory
manner. Upon one occasion, his master was telling a party of
ladies and gentlemen, at dinner, some conversation he had had in
Palestine, with King Richard I of England, whom he described as a
very particular friend of his. Signs of astonishment and
incredulity were visible on the faces of the company; upon which
St. Germain very coolly turned to his servant, who stood behind
his chair, and asked him if he had not spoken truth? "I really
cannot say," replied the man, without moving a muscle; "you
forget, sir, I have only been five hundred years in your service!"
"Ah! true," said his master; "I remember now; it was a little
before your time!"

Occasionally, when with men whom he could not so easily dupe, he
gave utterance to the contempt with which he could scarcely avoid
regarding such gaping credulity. "These fools of Parisians," said
he to the Baron de Gleichen, "believe me to be more than five
hundred years old; and, since they will have it so, I confirm them
in their idea. Not but that I really am much older than I appear."

Many other stories are related of this strange impostor; but
enough have been quoted to shew his character and pretensions. It
appears that he endeavoured to find the philosopher's stone; but
never boasted of possessing it. The Prince of Hesse Cassel, whom
he had known years before, in Germany, wrote urgent letters to
him, entreating him to quit Paris, and reside with him. St.
Germain at last consented. Nothing further is known of his career.
There were no gossipping memoir-writers at the court of Hesse
Cassel to chronicle his sayings and doings. He died at Sleswig,
under the roof of his friend the prince, in the year 1784.


Cagliostro

This famous charlatan, the friend and successor of St. Germain,
ran a career still more extraordinary. He was the arch-quack of
his age, the last of the great pretenders to the philosopher's
stone and the water of life, and during his brief season of
prosperity, one of the most conspicuous characters of Europe.

His real name was Joseph Balsamo. He was born at Palermo, about
the year 1743, of humble parentage. He had the misfortune to lose
his father during his infancy, and his education was left in
consequence to some relatives of his mother, the latter being too
poor to afford him any instruction beyond mere reading and
writing. He was sent in his fifteenth year to a monastery, to be
taught the elements of chemistry and physic; but his temper was so
impetuous, his indolence so invincible, and his vicious habits so
deeply rooted, that he made no progress. After remaining some
years, he left it with the character of an uninformed and
dissipated young man, with good natural talents but a bad
disposition. When he became of age, he abandoned himself to a life
of riot and debauchery, and entered himself, in fact, into that
celebrated fraternity, known in France and Italy as the "Knights
of Industry," and in England as the "Swell Mob." He was far from
being an idle or unwilling member of the corps. The first way in
which he distinguished himself was by forging orders of admission
to the theatres. He afterwards robbed his uncle, and counterfeited
a will. For acts like these, he paid frequent compulsory visits to
the prisons of Palermo. Somehow or other he acquired the character
of a sorcerer—of a man who had failed in discovering the secrets
of alchymy, and had sold his soul to the devil for the gold which
he was not able to make by means of transmutation. He took no
pains to disabuse the popular mind on this particular, but rather
encouraged the belief than otherwise. He at last made use of it to
cheat a silversmith named Marano, of about sixty ounces of gold,
and was in consequence obliged to leave Palermo. He persuaded this
man that he could shew him a treasure hidden in a cave, for which
service he was to receive the sixty ounces of gold, while the
silversmith was to have all the treasure for the mere trouble of
digging it up. They went together at midnight to an excavation in
the vicinity of Palermo, where Balsamo drew a magic circle, and
invoked the devil to shew his treasures. Suddenly there appeared
half a dozen fellows, the accomplices of the swindler, dressed to
represent devils, with horns on their heads, claws to their
fingers, and vomiting apparently red and blue flame. They were
armed with pitchforks, with which they belaboured poor Marano till
he was almost dead, and robbed him of his sixty ounces of gold and
all the valuables he carried about his person. They then made off,
accompanied by Balsamo, leaving the unlucky silversmith to recover
or die at his leisure. Nature chose the former course; and soon
after daylight he was restored to his senses, smarting in body
from his blows and in spirit for the deception of which he had
been the victim. His first impulse was to denounce Balsamo to the
magistrates of the town; but on further reflection he was afraid
of the ridicule that a full exposure of all the circumstances
would draw upon him; he therefore took the truly Italian
resolution of being revenged on Balsamo, by murdering him at the
first convenient opportunity. Having given utterance to this
threat in the hearing of a friend of Balsamo, it was reported to
the latter, who immediately packed up his valuables and quitted
Europe.

He chose Medina, in Arabia, for his future dwelling-place, and
there became acquainted with a Greek named Altotas, a man
exceedingly well versed in all the languages of the East, and an
indefatigable student of alchymy. He possessed an invaluable
collection of Arabian manuscripts on his favourite science, and
studied them with such unremitting industry that he found he had
not sufficient time to attend to his crucibles and furnaces
without neglecting his books. He was looking about for an
assistant when Balsamo opportunely presented himself, and made so
favourable an impression that he was at once engaged in that
capacity. But the relation of master and servant did not long
subsist between them; Balsamo was too ambitious and too clever to
play a secondary part, and within fifteen days of their first
acquaintance they were bound together as friends and partners.
Altotas, in the course of a long life devoted to alchymy, had
stumbled upon some valuable discoveries in chemistry, one of which
was an ingredient for improving the manufacture of flax, and
imparting to goods of that material a gloss and softness almost
equal to silk. Balsamo gave him the good advice to leave the
philosopher's stone for the present undiscovered, and make gold
out of their flax. The advice was taken, and they proceeded
together to Alexandria to trade, with a large stock of that
article. They stayed forty days in Alexandria, and gained a
considerable sum by their venture. They afterwards visited other
cities in Egypt, and were equally successful. They also visited
Turkey, where they sold drugs and amulets. On their return to
Europe, they were driven by stress of weather into Malta, and were
hospitably received by Pinto, the Grand Master of the Knights, and
a famous alchymist. They worked in his laboratory for some months,
and tried hard to change a pewter platter into a silver one.
Balsamo, having less faith than his companions, was sooner
wearied; and obtaining from his host many letters of introduction
to Rome and Naples, he left him and Altotas to find the
philosopher's stone and transmute the pewter platter without him.

He had long since dropped the name of Balsamo on account of the
many ugly associations that clung to it; and during his travels
had assumed at least half a score others, with titles annexed to
them. He called himself sometimes the Chevalier de Fischio, the
Marquis de Melissa, the Baron de Belmonte, de Pelligrini, d'Anna,
de Fenix, de Harat, but most commonly the Count de Cagliostro.
Under the latter title he entered Rome, and never afterwards
changed it. In this city he gave himself out as the restorer of
the Rosicrucian philosophy; said he could transmute all metals
into gold; that he could render himself invisible, cure all
diseases, and administer an elixir against old age and decay. His
letters from the Grand Master Pinto procured him an introduction
into the best families. He made money rapidly by the sale of his
elixir vitæ; and, like other quacks, performed many remarkable
cures by inspiring his patients with the most complete faith and
reliance upon his powers; an advantage which the most impudent
charlatans often possess over the regular practitioner.

While thus in a fair way of making his fortune he became
acquainted with the beautiful Lorenza Feliciana, a young lady of
noble birth, but without fortune. Cagliostro soon discovered that
she possessed accomplishments that were invaluable. Besides her
ravishing beauty, she had the readiest wit, the most engaging
manners, the most fertile imagination, and the least principle of
any of the maidens of Rome. She was just the wife for Cagliostro,
who proposed himself to her, and was accepted. After their
marriage, he instructed his fair Lorenza in all the secrets of his
calling—taught her pretty lips to invoke angels, and genii,
sylphs, salamanders, and undines, and, when need required, devils
and evil spirits. Lorenza was an apt scholar; she soon learned all
the jargon of the alchymists and all the spells of the enchanters;
and thus accomplished the hopeful pair set out on their travels,
to levy contributions on the superstitious and the credulous.

They first went to Sleswig on a visit to the Count de St. Germain,
their great predecessor in the art of making dupes, and were
received by him in the most magnificent manner. They no doubt
fortified their minds for the career they had chosen by the sage
discourse of that worshipful gentleman; for immediately after they
left him, they began their operations. They travelled for three or
four years in Russia, Poland, and Germany, transmuting metals,
telling fortunes, raising spirits, and selling the elixir vitæ
wherever they went; but there is no record of their doings from
whence to draw a more particular detail. It was not until they
made their appearance in England in 1776, that the names of the
Count and Countess di Cagliostro began to acquire a European
reputation. They arrived in London in the July of that year,
possessed of property in plate, jewels, and specie, to the amount
of about three thousand pounds. They hired apartments in Whitcombe
Street, and lived for some months quietly. In the same house there
lodged a Portuguese woman, named Blavary, who, being in
necessitous circumstances, was engaged by the cunt as interpreter.
She was constantly admitted into his laboratory, where he spent
much of his time in search of the philosopher's stone. She spread
abroad the fame of her entertainer in return for his hospitality,
and laboured hard to impress everybody with as full a belief in
his extraordinary powers as she felt herself; but as a female
interpreter of the rank and appearance of Madame Blavary did not
exactly correspond with the count's notions either of dignity or
decorum, he hired a person named Vitellini, a teacher of
languages, to act in that capacity. Vitellini was a desperate
gambler, a man who had tried almost every resource to repair his
ruined fortunes, including among the rest the search for the
philosopher's stone. Immediately that he saw the count's
operations, he was convinced that the great secret was his, and
that the golden gates of the palace of fortune were open to let
him in. With still more enthusiasm than Madame Blavary, he held
forth to his acquaintance, and in all public places, that the
count was an extraordinary man, a true adept, whose fortune was
immense, and who could transmute into pure and solid gold as much
lead, iron, and copper as he pleased. The consequence was, that
the house of Cagliostro was besieged by crowds of the idle, the
credulous, and the avaricious, all eager to obtain a sight of the
"philosopher," or to share in the boundless wealth which he could
call into existence.

Unfortunately for Cagliostro, he had fallen into evil hands.
Instead of duping the people of England, as he might have done, he
became himself the victim of a gang of swindlers, who, with the
fullest reliance on his occult powers, only sought to make money
of him. Vitellini introduced to him a ruined gambler like himself,
named Scot, whom he represented as a Scottish nobleman, attracted
to London solely by his desire to see and converse with the
extraordinary man whose fame had spread to the distant mountains
of the north. Cagliostro received him with great kindness and
cordiality; and "Lord" Scot thereupon introduced a woman named Fry
as Lady Scot, who was to act as chaperone to the Countess di
Cagliostro, and make her acquainted with all the noble families of
Britain. Thus things went swimmingly. "His lordship," whose
effects had not arrived from Scotland, and who had no banker in
London, borrowed two hundred pounds of the count. They were lent
without scruple, so flattered was Cagliostro by the attentions
they paid him, the respect, nay veneration they pretended to feel
for him, and the complete deference with which they listened to
every word that fell from his lips.

Superstitious like all desperate gamesters, Scot had often tried
magical and cabalistic numbers, in the hope of discovering lucky
numbers in the lottery or at the roulette-tables. He had in his
possession a cabalistic manuscript, containing various
arithmetical combinations of the kind, which he submitted to
Cagliostro, with an urgent request that he would select a number.
Cagliostro took the manuscript and studied it, but, as he himself
informs us, with no confidence in its truth. He, however,
predicted twenty as the successful number for the 6th of November
following. Scot ventured a small sum upon this number, out of the
two hundred pounds he had borrowed, and won. Cagliostro, incited
by this success, prognosticated number twenty-five for the next
drawing. Scot tried again, and won a hundred guineas. The numbers
fifty-five and fifty-seven were announced with equal success for
the 18th of the same month, to the no small astonishment and
delight of Cagliostro, who thereupon resolved to try fortune for
himself, and not for others. To all the entreaties of Scot and his
lady that he would predict more numbers for them, he turned a deaf
ear, even while he still thought him a lord and a man of honour;
but when he discovered that he was a mere swindler, and the
pretended Lady Scot an artful woman of the town, he closed his
door upon them and on all their gang.

Having complete faith in the supernatural powers of the count,
they were in the deepest distress at having lost his countenance.
They tried by every means their ingenuity could suggest to
propitiate him again; they implored, they threatened, and
endeavoured to bribe him; but all was vain. Cagliostro would
neither see nor correspond with them. In the mean time they lived
extravagantly, and in the hope of future, exhausted all their
present gains. They were reduced to the last extremity, when Miss
Fry obtained access to the countess, and received a guinea from
her on the representation that she was starving. Miss Fry, not
contented with this, begged her to intercede with her husband,
that for the last time he would point out a lucky number in the
lottery. The countess promised to exert her influence; and
Cagliostro, thus entreated, named the number eight, at the same
time reiterating his determination to have no more to do with any
of them. By an extraordinary hazard, which filled Cagliostro with
surprise and pleasure, number eight was the greatest prize in the
lottery. Miss Fry and her associates cleared fifteen hundred
guineas by the adventure, and became more than ever convinced of
the occult powers of Cagliostro, and strengthened in their
determination never to quit him until they had made their
fortunes. Out of the proceeds Miss Fry bought a handsome necklace
at a pawnbroker's for ninety guineas. She then ordered a
richly-chased gold box, having two compartments, to be made at a
jeweller's, and putting the necklace in the one, filled the other
with a fine aromatic snuff. She then sought another interview with
Madame di Cagliostro, and urged her to accept the box as a small
token of her esteem and gratitude, without mentioning the valuable
necklace that was concealed in it. Madame di Cagliostro accepted
the present, and was from that hour exposed to the most incessant
persecution from all the confederates—Blavary, Vitellini, and the
pretended Lord and Lady Scot. They flattered themselves they had
regained their lost footing in the house, and came day after day
to know lucky numbers in the lottery, sometimes forcing themselves
up the stairs, and into the count's laboratory, in spite of the
efforts of the servants to prevent them. Cagliostro, exasperated
at their pertinacity, threatened to call in the assistance of the
magistrates, and taking Miss Fry by the shoulders, pushed her into
the street.

From that time may be dated the misfortunes of Cagliostro. Miss
Fry, at the instigation of her paramour, determined on vengeance.
Her first act was to swear a debt of two hundred pounds against
Cagliostro, and to cause him to be arrested for that sum. While he
was in custody in a sponging-house, Scot, accompanied by a low
attorney, broke into his laboratory, and carried off a small box,
containing, as they believed, the powder of transmutation, and a
number of cabalistic manuscripts and treatises upon alchymy. They
also brought an action against him for the recovery of the
necklace; and Miss Fry accused both him and his countess of
sorcery and witchcraft, and of foretelling numbers in the lottery
by the aid of the Devil. This latter charge was actually heard
before Mr. Justice Miller. The action of trover for the necklace
was tried before the Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, who
recommended the parties to submit to arbitration. In the mean time
Cagliostro remained in prison for several weeks, till having
procured bail, he was liberated. He was soon after waited upon by
an attorney named Reynolds, also deep in the plot, who offered to
compromise all the actions upon certain conditions. Scot, who had
accompanied him, concealed himself behind the door, and suddenly
rushing out, presented a pistol at the heart of Cagliostro,
swearing he would shoot him instantly, if he would not tell him
truly the art of predicting lucky numbers, and of transmuting
metals. Reynolds pretending to be very angry, disarmed his
accomplice, and entreated the count to satisfy them by fair means,
and disclose his secrets, promising that if he would do so, they
would discharge all the actions, and offer him no further
molestation. Cagliostro replied, that threats and entreaties were
alike useless; that he knew no secrets; and that the powder of
transmutation of which they had robbed him, was of no value to any
body but himself. He offered, however, if they would discharge the
actions, and return the powder and the manuscripts, he would
forgive them all the money they had swindled him out of. These
conditions were refused; and Scot and Reynolds departed, swearing
vengeance against him.

Cagliostro appears to have been quite ignorant of the forms of law
in England, and to have been without a friend to advise him as to
the best course he should pursue. While he was conversing with his
countess on the difficulties that beset them, one of his bail
called, and invited him to ride in a hackney coach to the house of
a person who would see him righted. Cagliostro consented, and was
driven to the King's Bench prison, where his friend left him. He
did not discover for several hours that he was a prisoner, or, in
fact, understand the process of being surrendered by one's bail.

He regained his liberty in a few weeks; and the arbitrators
between him and Miss Fry made their award against him. He was
ordered to pay the two hundred pounds she had sworn against him,
and to restore the necklace and gold box which had been presented
to the countess. Cagliostro was so disgusted, that he determined
to quit England. His pretensions, besides, had been unmercifully
exposed by a Frenchman, named Morande, the editor of the Courier
de l'Europe, published in London. To add to his distress, he was
recognised in Westminster Hall as Joseph Balsamo, the swindler of
Palermo. Such a complication of disgrace was not to be borne. He
and his countess packed up their small effects, and left England
with no more than fifty pounds, out of the three thousand they had
brought with them.

They first proceeded to Brussels, where fortune was more
auspicious. They sold considerable quantities of the elixir of
life, performed many cures, and recruited their finances. They
then took their course through Germany to Russia, and always with
the same success. Gold flowed into their coffers faster than they
could count it. They quite forgot all the woes they had endured in
England, and learned to be more circumspect in the choice of their
acquaintance.

In the year 1780, they made their appearance in Strasbourg. Their
fame had reached that city before them. They took a magnificent
hotel, and invited all the principal persons of the place to their
table. Their wealth appeared to be boundless, and their
hospitality equal to it. Both the count and countess acted as
physicians, and gave money, advice, and medicine to all the
necessitous and suffering of the town. Many of the cures they
performed astonished those regular practitioners who did not make
sufficient allowance for the wonderful influence of imagination in
certain cases. The countess, who at this time was not more than
five-and-twenty, and all radiant with grace, beauty, and
cheerfulness, spoke openly of her eldest son as a fine young man
of eight-and-twenty, who had been for some years a captain in the
Dutch service. The trick succeeded to admiration. All the ugly old
women in Strasbourg, and for miles around, thronged the saloon of
the countess to purchase the liquid which was to make them as
blooming as their daughters; the young women came in equal
abundance that they might preserve their charms, and when twice as
old as Ninon de L'Enclos, be more captivating than she; while men
were not wanting fools enough to imagine that they might keep off
the inevitable stroke of the grim foe by a few drops of the same
incomparable elixir. The countess, sooth to say, looked like an
incarnation of immortal loveliness, a very goddess of youth and
beauty; and it is possible that the crowds of young men and old,
who at all convenient seasons haunted the perfumed chambers of
this enchantress, were attracted less by their belief in her
occult powers than from admiration of her languishing bright eyes
and sparkling conversation. But amid all the incense that was
offered at her shrine, Madame di Cagliostro was ever faithful to
her spouse. She encouraged hopes, it is true, but she never
realised them; she excited admiration, yet kept it within bounds;
and made men her slaves, without ever granting a favour of which
the vainest might boast.

In this city they made the acquaintance of many eminent persons,
and among others, of the Cardinal Prince de Rohan, who was
destined afterwards to exercise so untoward an influence over
their fate. The cardinal, who seems to have had great faith in him
as a philosopher, persuaded him to visit Paris in his company,
which he did, but remained only thirteen days. He preferred the
society of Strasbourg, and returned thither with the intention of
fixing his residence far from the capital. But he soon found that
the first excitement of his arrival had passed away. People began
to reason with themselves, and to be ashamed of their own
admiration. The populace, among whom he had lavished his charity
with a bountiful hand, accused him of being the Antichrist, the
Wandering Jew, the man of fourteen hundred years of age, a demon
in human shape, sent to lure the ignorant to their destruction;
while the more opulent and better informed called him a spy in the
pay of foreign governments, an agent of the police, a swindler,
and a man of evil life. The outcry grew at last so strong, that he
deemed it prudent to try his fortune elsewhere.

He went first to Naples, but that city was too near Palermo; he
dreaded recognition from some of his early friends, and, after a
short stay, returned to France. He chose Bourdeaux as his next
dwelling-place, and created as great a sensation there as he had
done in Strasbourg. He announced himself as the founder of a new
school of medicine and philosophy, boasted of his ability to cure
all diseases, and invited the poor and suffering to visit him, and
he would relieve the distress of the one class, and cure the
ailings of the other. All day long the street opposite his
magnificent hotel was crowded by the populace; the halt and the
blind, women with sick babes in their arms, and persons suffering
under every species of human infirmity, flocked to this wonderful
doctor. The relief he afforded in money more than counterbalanced
the failure of his nostrums; and the affluence of people from all
the surrounding country became so great, that the jurats of the
city granted him a military guard, to be stationed day and night
before his door, to keep order. The anticipations of Cagliostro
were realised. The rich were struck with admiration of his charity
and benevolence, and impressed with a full conviction of his
marvellous powers. The sale of the elixir went on admirably. His
saloons were thronged with wealthy dupes who came to purchase
immortality. Beauty, that would endure for centuries, was the
attraction for the fair sex; health and strength for the same
period were the baits held out to the other. His charming countess
in the meantime, brought grist to the mill by telling fortunes and
casting nativities, or granting attendant sylphs to any ladies who
would pay sufficiently for their services. What was still better,
as tending to keep up the credit of her husband, she gave the most
magnificent parties in Bourdeaux.

But as at Strasbourg the popular delusion lasted for a few months
only, and burned itself out; Cagliostro forgot, in the
intoxication of success, that there was a limit to quackery which
once passed inspired distrust. When he pretended to call spirits
from the tomb, people became incredulous. He was accused of being
an enemy to religion, of denying Christ, and of being the
Wandering Jew. He despised these rumours as long as they were
confined to a few; but when they spread over the town, when he
received no more fees, when his parties were abandoned, and his
acquaintance turned away when they met him in the street, he
thought it high time to shift his quarters.

He was by this time wearied of the provinces, and turned his
thoughts to the capital. On his arrival, he announced himself as
the restorer of Egyptian Freemasonry and the founder of a new
philosophy. He immediately made his way into the best society by
means of his friend the Cardinal de Rohan. His success as a
magician was quite extraordinary: the most considerable persons of
the time visited him. He boasted of being able, like the
Rosicrucians, to converse with the elementary spirits; to invoke
the mighty dead from the grave, to transmute metals, and to
discover occult things, by means of the special protection of God
towards him. Like Dr. Dee, he summoned the angels to reveal the
future; and they appeared, and conversed with him in crystals and
under glass bells.38* "There was hardly," says the Biographie des
Contemporains, "a fine lady in Paris who would not sup with the
shade of Lucretius in the apartments of Cagliostro; a military
officer who would not discuss the art of war with Cæsar, Hannibal,
or Alexander; or an advocate or counsellor who would not argue
legal points with the ghost of Cicero." These interviews with the
departed were very expensive; for, as Cagliostro said, the dead
would not rise for nothing. The countess, as usual, exercised all
her ingenuity to support her husband's credit. She was a great
favourite with her own sex, to many a delighted and wondering
auditory of whom she detailed the marvellous powers of Cagliostro.
She said he could render himself invisible, traverse the world
with the rapidity of thought, and be in several places at the same
time.39*

He had not been long at Paris before he became involved in the
celebrated affair of the queen's necklace. His friend the Cardinal
de Rohan, enamoured of the charms of Marie Antoinette, was in sore
distress at her coldness, and the displeasure she had so often
manifested against him. There was at that time a lady named La
Motte in the service of the queen, of whom the cardinal was
foolish enough to make a confidant. Madame de la Motte, in return,
endeavoured to make a tool of the cardinal, and succeeded but too
well in her projects. In her capacity of chamber-woman, or lady of
honour to the queen, she was present at an interview between her
majesty and M. Boehmer, a wealthy jeweller of Paris, when the
latter offered for sale a magnificent diamond necklace, valued at
1,600,000 francs, or about 64,000l. sterling. The queen admired it
greatly, but dismissed the jeweller, with the expression of her
regret that she was too poor to purchase it. Madame de la Motte
formed a plan to get this costly ornament into her own possession,
and determined to make the Cardinal de Rohan the instrument by
which to effect it. She therefore sought an interview with him,
and pretending to sympathise in his grief for the queen's
displeasure, told him she knew a way by which he might be restored
to favour. She then mentioned the necklace, and the sorrow of the
queen that she could not afford to buy it. The cardinal, who was
as wealthy as he was foolish, immediately offered to purchase the
necklace, and make a present of it to the queen. Madame de la
Motte told him by no means to do so, as he would thereby offend
her majesty. His plan would be to induce the jeweller to give her
majesty credit, and accept her promissory note for the amount at a
certain date, to be hereafter agreed upon. The cardinal readily
agreed to the proposal, and instructed the jeweller to draw up an
agreement, and he would procure the queen's signature. He placed
this in the hands of Madame de la Motte, who returned it shortly
afterwards, with the words, "Bon, bon—approuvé—Marie Antoinette,"
written in the margin. She told him at the same time that the
queen was highly pleased with his conduct in the matter, and would
appoint a meeting with him in the gardens of Versailles, when she
would present him with a flower, as a token of her regard. The
Cardinal shewed the forged document to the jeweller, obtained the
necklace, and delivered it into the hands of Madame de la Motte.
So far all was well. Her next object was to satisfy the cardinal,
who awaited impatiently the promised interview with his royal
mistress. There was at that time in Paris a young woman named
D'Oliva, noted for her resemblance to the queen; and Madame de la
Motte, on the promise of a handsome reward, found no difficulty in
persuading her to personate Marie Antoinette, and meet the
Cardinal de Rohan at the evening twilight in the gardens of
Versailles. The meeting took place accordingly. The cardinal was
deceived by the uncertain light, the great resemblance of the
counterfeit, and his own hopes; and having received the flower
from Mademoiselle D'Oliva, went home with a lighter heart than had
beat in his bosom for many a day.40*

In the course of time the forgery of the queen's signature was
discovered. Boehmer the jeweller immediately named the Cardinal de
Rohan and Madame de la Motte as the persons with whom he had
negotiated, and they were both arrested and thrown into the
Bastille. La Motte was subjected to a rigorous examination, and
the disclosures she made implicating Cagliostro, he was seized,
along with his wife, and also sent to the Bastille. A story
involving so much scandal necessarily excited great curiosity.
Nothing was to be heard of in Paris but the queen's necklace, with
surmises of the guilt or innocence of the several parties
implicated. The husband of Madame de la Motte escaped to England,
and in the opinion of many took the necklace with him, and there
disposed of it to different jewellers in small quantities at a
time. But Madame de la Motte insisted that she had entrusted it to
Cagliostro, who had seized and taken it to pieces, to "swell the
treasures of his immense unequalled fortune." She spoke of him as
"an empiric, a mean alchymist, a dreamer on the philosopher's
stone, a false prophet, a profaner of the true worship, the
self-dubbed Count Cagliostro!" She further said that he originally
conceived the project of ruining the Cardinal de Rohan; that he
persuaded her, by the exercise of some magic influence over her
mind, to aid and abet the scheme; and that he was a robber, a
swindler, and a sorcerer!

After all the accused parties had remained for upwards of six
months in the Bastille, the trial commenced. The depositions of
the witnesses having been heard, Cagliostro, as the principal
culprit, was first called upon for his defence. He was listened to
with the most breathless attention. He put himself into a
theatrical attitude, and thus began:—"I am oppressed!—I am
accused!—I am calumniated! Have I deserved this fate? I descend
into my conscience, and I there find the peace that men refuse me!
I have travelled a great deal—I am known over all Europe, and a
great part of Asia and Africa. I have everywhere shewn myself the
friend of my fellow-creatures. My knowledge, my time, my fortune
have ever been employed in the relief of distress. I have studied
and practised medicine, but I have never degraded that most noble
and most consoling of arts by mercenary speculations of any kind.
Though always giving, and never receiving, I have preserved my
independence. I have even carried my delicacy so far as to refuse
the favours of kings. I have given gratuitously my remedies and my
advice to the rich: the poor have received from me both remedies
and money. I have never contracted any debts, and my manners are
pure and uncorrupted." After much more self-laudation of the same
kind, he went on to complain of the great hardships he had endured
in being separated for so many months from his innocent and loving
wife, who, as he was given to understand, had been detained in the
Bastille, and perhaps chained in an unwholesome dungeon. He denied
unequivocally that he had the necklace, or that he had ever seen
it; and to silence the rumours and accusations against him, which
his own secrecy with regard to the events of his life had perhaps
originated, he expressed himself ready to satisfy the curiosity of
the public, and to give a plain and full account of his career. He
then told a romantic and incredible tale, which imposed upon no
one. He said he neither knew the place of his birth nor the name
of his parents, but that he spent his infancy in Medina, in
Arabia, and was brought up under the name of Acharat. He lived in
the palace of the Great Muphti in that city, and always had three
servants to wait upon him, besides his preceptor, named Althotas.
This Althotas was very fond of him, and told him that his father
and mother, who were Christians and nobles, died when he was three
months old, and left him in the care of the Muphti. He could
never, he said, ascertain their names, for whenever he asked
Althotas the question, he was told that it would be dangerous for
him to know. Some incautious expressions dropped by his preceptor
gave him reason to think they were from Malta. At the age of
twelve he began his travels, and learned the various languages of
the East. He remained three years in Mecca, where the cherif, or
governor, shewed him so much kindness, and spoke to him so
tenderly and affectionately, that he sometimes thought that
personage was his father. He quitted this good man with tears in
his eyes, and never saw him afterwards; but he was convinced that
he was, even at that moment, indebted to his care for all the
advantages he enjoyed. Whenever he arrived in any city, either of
Europe or Asia, he found an account opened for him at the
principal bankers' or merchants'. He could draw upon them to the
amount of thousands and hundreds of thousands; and no questions
were ever asked beyond his name. He had only to mention the word
'Acharat,' and all his wants were supplied. He firmly believed
that the Cherif of Mecca was the friend to whom all was owing.
This was the secret of his wealth, and he had no occasion to
resort to swindling for a livelihood. It was not worth his while
to steal a diamond necklace when he had wealth enough to purchase
as many as he pleased, and more magnificent ones than had ever
been worn by a queen of France. As to the other charges brought
against him by Madame de la Motte, he had but a short answer to
give. She had called him an empiric. He was not unfamiliar with
the word. If it meant a man who, without being a physician, had
some knowledge of medicine, and took no fees—who cured both rich
and poor, and took no money from either, he confessed that he was
such a man, that he was an empiric. She had also called him a mean
alchymist. Whether he were an alchymist or not, the epithet mean
could only be applied to those who begged and cringed, and he had
never done either. As regarded his being a dreamer about the
philosopher's stone, whatever his opinions upon that subject might
be, he had been silent, and had never troubled the public with his
dreams. Then, as to his being a false prophet, he had not always
been so; for he had prophesied to the Cardinal de Rohan that
Madame de la Motte would prove a dangerous woman, and the result
had verified the prediction. He denied that he was a profaner of
the true worship, or that he had ever striven to bring religion
into contempt; on the contrary, he respected every man's religion,
and never meddled with it. He also denied that he was a
Rosicrucian, or that he had ever pretended to be three hundred
years of age, or to have had one man in his service for a hundred
and fifty years. In conclusion, he said every statement that
Madame de la Motte had made regarding him was false, and that she
was mentiris impudentissime, which two words he begged her counsel
to translate for her, as it was not polite to tell her so in
French.

Such was the substance of his extraordinary answer to the charges
against him; an answer which convinced those who were before
doubtful that he was one of the most impudent impostors that had
ever run the career of deception. Counsel were then heard on
behalf of the Cardinal de Rohan and Madame de la Motte. It
appearing clearly that the Cardinal was himself the dupe of a vile
conspiracy; and there being no evidence against Cagliostro, they
were both acquitted. Madame de la Motte was found guilty, and
sentenced to be publicly whipped, and branded with a hot iron on
the back.

Cagliostro and his wife were then discharged from custody. On
applying to the officers of the Bastille for the papers and
effects which had been seized at his lodgings, he found that many
of them had been abstracted. He thereupon brought an action
against them for the recovery of his Mss. and a small portion of
the powder of transmutation. Before the affair could be decided,
he received orders to quit Paris within four-and-twenty hours.
Fearing that if he were once more enclosed in the dungeons of the
Bastille he should never see daylight again, he took his departure
immediately and proceeded to England. On his arrival in London he
made the acquaintance of the notorious Lord George Gordon, who
espoused his cause warmly, and inserted a letter in the public
papers, animadverting upon the conduct of the Queen of France in
the affair of the necklace, and asserting that she was really the
guilty party. For this letter Lord George was exposed to a
prosecution at the instance of the French ambassador, found guilty
of libel, and sentenced to fine and a long imprisonment.

Cagliostro and the countess afterwards travelled in Italy, where
they were arrested by the Papal government in 1789, and condemned
to death. The charges against him were, that he was a freemason, a
heretic, and a sorcerer. This unjustifiable sentence was
afterwards commuted into one of perpetual imprisonment in the
Castle of St. Angelo. His wife was allowed to escape severer
punishment by immuring herself in a nunnery. Cagliostro did not
long survive. The loss of liberty preyed upon his mind—accumulated
misfortunes had injured his health and broken his spirit, and he
died early in 1790. His fate may have been no better than he
deserved, but it is impossible not to feel that his sentence for
the crimes assigned was utterly disgraceful to the government that
pronounced it.


Present State of Alchymy

We have now finished the list of the persons who have most
distinguished themselves in this foolish and unprofitable pursuit.
Among them are men of all ranks, characters, and conditions; the
truth-seeking but erring philosopher; the ambitious prince and the
needy noble, who have believed in it; as well as the designing
charlatan, who has not believed in it, but has merely made the
pretension to it the means of cheating his fellows, and living
upon their credulity. One or more of all these classes will be
found in the foregoing pages. It will be seen, from the record of
their lives, that the delusion was not altogether without its
uses. Men, in striving to gain too much, do not always overreach
themselves; if they cannot arrive at the inaccessible
mountain-top, they may perhaps get half way towards it, and pick
up some scraps of wisdom and knowledge on the road. The useful
science of chemistry is not a little indebted to its spurious
brother of alchymy. Many valuable discoveries have been made in
that search for the impossible, which might otherwise have been
hidden for centuries yet to come. Roger Bacon, in searching for
the philosopher's stone, discovered gunpowder, a still more
extraordinary substance. Van Helmont, in the same pursuit,
discovered the properties of gas; Geber made discoveries in
chemistry which were equally important; and Paracelsus, amidst his
perpetual visions of the transmutation of metals, found that
mercury was a remedy for one of the most odious and excruciating
of all the diseases that afflict humanity.

In our day little mention is made in Europe of any new devotees of
the science, though it is affirmed that one or two of our most
illustrious men of science do not admit the pursuit to be so
absurd and vain as it has been commonly considered in recent
times. The belief in witchcraft, which is scarcely more absurd,
still lingers in the popular mind: but few are so credulous as to
believe that any elixir could make man live for centuries, or turn
all our iron and pewter into gold. Alchymy, in Europe, may be said
to be almost wholly exploded; but in the East it still flourishes
in as great repute as ever. Recent travellers make constant
mention of it, especially in China, Hindostan, Persia, Tartary,
Egypt, and Arabia.