Alchemy - LE PELLETIER (Jean). L'Alkaest ou le Dissolvant universel de Van-Helmont, revelé dans plusieurs Traitez qui en découvrent le Secret. Rouen, Guillaume Behourt, 1704.
In-12 of (2) ff, 256 pp, (2) ff. Marbled calf, spine ribbed and decorated, red tr. (period binding).
Rare first edition of this work devoted to an alchemical substance named "Alchahest" by Paracelsus and taken up by the German physician-chemist Jean-Baptiste van Helmont to designate the universal dissolver capable of bringing any body back to its raw material. Despite its paradoxical properties (this hypothetical solvent could not be contained in any container), the concept was often studied by chemists and alchemists from the second half of the 17th century to the beginning of the 18th century.
"It is a curious and highly esteemed work, according to Lenglet-D.; composed of a selection of articles taken from the works of Philalèthe, Ripley, George Starkey, etc.; from p. 189 onwards, we find the following work by the latter: Liquor Alkaest or Discourse touching the immortal dissolver of Paracelsus, etc." Caillet (6550).
Nice copy.
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