BOOKS.
THE STRANGE ADVENTURE OF JOHN FREDERICK HELVETIUS.*
THERE is a freemasonry among that strangely happy band who
love books, whether they are millionaires with the collector's mania, true scholars, men whose trade and calling is biblio- graphy, librarians or booksellers, or whether they are those omnivorous general readers who will fly at any game put up as long as it is " between boards." One of the inner secrets known by the book-lover is this. However apparently dull, heavy, useless, and impossible a book is, the authentic book-lover can always find something in it worth reading. Often, indeed, he finds the pearl of price in the most impossible oyster. The book- lover's feeling about books is, indeed, like that of the Mohamme- dan. The orthodox Mohammedan will never destroy a book of any sort, whether written or printed. It may, he says, contain the name of Allah. Those who hold the book-faith true and undefiled have a similar feeling. A book may contain anything. At the lowest it is a lottery ticket with an off-chance of a great prize if not in cash yet in delight.
It has just chanced to the present reviewer to enjoy one of the unexpected gifts provided by the practice of this free- masonry. What could seem more dull or impossible than An Encyclopaedia of Occultism ? Yet he had hardly opened the book when he found what is going to be one of the treasures of his life—a veritable proof that there is always something in a book if only you can find it. What he found was no less than a story of the Philosophers' Stone, written by John Frederick Helvetius, a physician at the Hague, and apparently translated, as the reader will see, by Robert Louis Stevenson, or at any rate some spiritual ancestor who had got exactly the Stevensonian touch and style. Who but Stevenson could have written : " His manner of address was honest, grave, authoritative ; his stature was low, with a long face and hair black, his chin smooth " ? Again, " He seemed like a native of the North of Scotland " is pure Kidnapped.
John Frederick Helvetius published in 1667 a work concerning a strange adventure of his life in which he claimed to have taken part in a veritable act of metallic transmutation by alchemical processes. The book was translated into English and published in London in 1670 under the title Of a Transmutation. It is, we are informed by the editor of An Encyclopaedia of Occultism, " one of the few exact descriptions of such an experiment," and for that sufficient reason it is quoted in full. We cannot do better than follow the editorial example :—
" On the 27th December, 1666, in the afternoon, a stranger, in a plain, rustic dress, came to my house at the Hague. His manner of address was honest, grave, authoritative • his stature was low, with a long face and hair black, his Chin smooth. He seemed like a native of the north of Scotland, and I guessed he was about forty-four years old. After saluting me he requested me most respectfully to pardon his rude intrusion, but that his love of the pyrotechnic art made him visit me. Having read some of my small treatises, particularly that against the sym- pathetic powder of Sir Kenelm Digby and observed therein my doubt of the Hermetic mystery, it caused him to request • An Encyclopaed{a of Occultism. By Lewis Spence. Leaden: Reatiedge. (Os. net.] this interview. He asked me if I still thought there was no medicine in Nature which could cure all diseases, unless the principal parts, as the lungs, liver, &c., were perished, or the time of death were come. To which I replied I never met with an adept, or saw such a medicine, though I read of much of it and often wished for it. Then I asked if he was a physician. He said he was a founder of brass, yet from his youth learned many rare things in chemistry, particularly of a friend—the manner to extract out of metals many medicinal arcana by the use of fire. After discoursing of experiments in metals, he asked me, would I know the philosophers' stone if I saw it ? I answered, I would not, though I read much of it in Paracelsus, Helmont, Basil, and others, yet I dare not say I could know the philoso- phers' matter. In the interim he drew from his breast pocket a neat ivory box, and out of it took three ponderous lumps of the stone, each about the size of a small walnut. They were transparent and of a pale brimstone colour, whereto some scales of the crucible adhered when this most noble substance was melted. The value of it I since calculated was twenty tons weight of gold. When I had greedily examined and handled the stone almost a quarter of an hour, and heard from the owner many rare secrets of its admirable effects in human and metallic bodies, also its other wonderful properties, I returned him this treasure of treasures, truly with a most sorrowful mind, like those who conquer themselves, yet, as was just, very thankfully and humbly. I further desired to know why the colour was yellow, and not red, ruby colour, or purple, as the philosophers write. He answered that was nothing, for the matter was mature and ripe enough. Then I humbly requested him to bestow a little piece of the medicine on me, in perpetual memory of him, though but of the size of a coriander or hemp seed: He presently answered, Oh no, this is not lawful, though thou wouldat give me as many ducats in gold as would fill this room, not for the value of the metal, but for some particular consequences. Nay, if it were possible,' said he, that fire could be burnt by fire, I would rather at this instant cast all this substance into the fiercest flames.' He then demanded if I had a more private chamber, as this was seen from the public street. I presently conducted him into the best furnished room backward, not doubting but he would bestow part thereof or some great treasure on me. He entered without wiping his shoes, although they were full of snow and dirt. He asked me for a little piece of gold, and, pulling off his cloak, opened his vest, under which he had five pieces of gold. They were hanging to a green silk ribbon, and were of the size of breakfast plates. This gold so far excelled mine that there was no comparison for flexibility and colour. The inscriptions engraver upon them he granted me to write out ; they were pious thanksgivings to God, dated 20th August, 1666, with the characters of the Sun, Mercury, the Moon, and the signs of Leo and Libra. I was in great admiration, and desired to know where and how he obtained them. He answered, A foreigner, who dwelt some days in my house, said he was a lover of this science, and came to reveal it to me. . . .' As soon as his relation was finished, I asked my visitor to show me the effect of transmutation and so confirm my faith ' • but he declined it for that time in such a discreet manner that I was satisfied, he promising to come again in three weeks, to show me some curious arts in the fire, provided it were then lawful without prohibition. At the three weeks end he came, and invited me abroad for an hour or two. In our walk we discoursed of Nature's secrets, but he was very silent on the subject of the great elixir; gravely asserted that it was only to magnify the sweet fame and mercy of the most glorious God ; that few men endeavoured to serve Him, and this he expressed as a pastor or minister of a church ; but I recalled his attention, entreating him to show me the metallic mystery, desiring also that he would eat, drink, and lodge at my house, which I pressed, but he was of so fixed a determination that all my endeavours were frustrated. I could not forbear to tell him that I had a laboratory ready for an experiment, and that a promised favour was a kind of debt. ` Yes, true,' said he, but I promised to teach thee at my return, with this proviso, if it were not forbidden.' When I perceived that all this was in vain, I earnestly requested a small crumb of his powder, sufficient to transmute a few grains of lead to gold, and at last, out of his philosophical commiseration, he gave me as much as a turnip seed in size, saying, Receive this small parcel of the greatest treasure of the world, which truly few kings or princes have ever seen or known.' But,' I said, this perhaps will not transmute four grains of lead,' whereupon he bid me deliver it back to him, which, in hopes of a greater parcel, I did, but ho, cutting half off with his nail, flung it into the fire, and gave me the rest wrapped neatly up in blue paper, saying, It is yet sufficient for thee.' I answered him, indeed with a most dejected countenance, Sir, what means this ? The other being too little, you giVe me now less.' He told me to put into the crucible half an ounce of lead, for there ought to be no more lead put in than the medicine can transmute. I gave him great thanks for my diminished treasure, concentrated truly in the superlative degree, and put it charily up into my little box, saying I meant to try it the next day, nor would I reveal it to any. Not so, not so,' said he, for we ought to divulge all things to the children of art which may tend alone to the honour of God, that so they may live in the theosophical truth.' I now made a confession to him, that while the mass of his medicine was in my hands, I endeavoured to scrape away a little of it with my nail, and could not forbear ; but scratched off so very little, that, it being picked from my nail, wrapped in a paper, and projected on melted lead, I found no transmutation, but almost the whole mass sublimed, while the remainder was a glassy earth. At this unexpected account be immediately said, ' You are more dexterous to commit theft than to apply the medicine, for if you had only wrapped up the stolen prey in yellow wax, to preserve it from the fumes of the lead, it would have sunk to the bottom, and transmuted it to gold ; but having cast it into the fumes, the violence of the vapour, partly by its sympathetic alliance, carried the medicine quite away. I brought him the crucible, and he perceived a most beautiful saffron-like tincture sticking to the sides. He promised to come next morning at nine o'clock, to show me that this tincture would transmute the lead into gold. Having taken his leave, I impatiently awaited his return, but the next day he came not, nor ever since. He sent an excuse at half-past nine that morning, and promised to come at three in the afternoon, but I never heard of him since. I soon began to doubt the whole matter. Late that night my wife, who was a most curious student and inquirer after the art, came soliciting me to make an experiment of that little grain of the stone, to be assured of the truth. Unless this be done,' said she, ' I shall have no rest or sleep this night.' She being so earnest, I commanded a fire to be made, saying to myself, I fear, I fear indeed, this man hath deluded me.' My wife wrapped the said matter in wax, and I cut half an ounce of lead, and put it into a crucible in the fire. Being melted, my wife put in the medicine, made into a small pill with the wax, which presently made a hissing noise, and in a quarter of an hour the mass of lead was totally transmuted into the best and finest gold, which amazed us exceedingly. We could not sufficiently gaze upon this admirable and miraculous work of nature, for the melted lead, after pro- jection, showed on the fire the rarest and most beautiful colours imaginable, settling in green, and when poured forth into an ingot, it had the lively fresh colour of blood. When cold it shined as the purest and most splendid gold. Truly all those who were standing about me were exceedingly startled, and I ran with this muffled lead, being yet hot, to the goldsmith, who wondered at the fineness, and after a short trial by the test, said it was the most excellent gold in the world."
When a man has done one so good a turn as this, it would be manners of the worst not to make him a salute. There- fore we will add that, quite apart from Helvetius, An Encyclo- paedia of Occultism is what it describes itself—" A Compendium of Information on the Occult Sciences, Occult Personalities, Psychic Science, Magic, Demonology, Spiritism, and Mysticism." Though Mr. Lewis Spence, if he will allow us to say so without ill-will, is too much given to the futilities and absurdities of Occultism—is too much of an alchemist and too little of a chemist—we are bound to say that he writes like a scholar. Unlike so many writers on things occult, he can treat his theme seriously without being futile, absurd, and infantile. Given his theme, there is the minimum of cant. Indeed, the book, from many points of view, may prove useful to those who are perplexed by the ambiguities of occultism, magic, and the rest. Putting it at the lowest, the book is one which will reward casual openings by many curious discoveries. Read the follow- ing, taken purely at random :— " BLINDFOLDING A CORPSE : The Afritens of the Shari River in Central America were wont to blindfold a corpse before burying it, to prevent it from returning to haunt the survivors."
That might be of great use to a writer of "Shockers" ! The police would find on Wimbledon Common a blindfolded corpse. This would lead the Inspector Skill of the story at once to envisage the crime as committed by a Central American. The Inspector is, of course, a scholar of illimitable knowledge. In the end the crime is traced to the morganatic wife of a " relapsed " ex- President of the Republic of Costa Dora of the said tribe. A night scene on the Shari River would make admirable "copy." One more touch. After the police have removed the blind- folding, a strangely scented and vividly coloured Indian handker- chief, quite a lot of haunting takes place in the Z Division of the Metropolitan Police. When, however, the corpse is re- blindfolded by the special directions of Inspector Skill, the worst hauntings stop. It is, however, several months before Rosa Dawlish, shorthand-typist in the Ministry of Health and fiancée of the Inspector, ceases to see a sallow man with sandy whiskers pounding the head of a magnificent Othello-like negro with a dwarf motor-jack in a moonlight glade on Wimbledon Common.
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