Barchusen,J.C. Lot n° 18

Pyrosophia, succincte atque breviter iatro-chemiam, rein metallicam et chrysopoeiam pervestigans. Opus medicis, physicis, chemicis, pharmacopoeis, metallicis &c. non inutile. Leiden, C. Boutestein 1698. cl.4°. With 5 (1 multiply folded) copper plates and 1 woodcut title vign. 8 nn. Bl., 469, 1 p. Prgt. d. Ferguson I, 71, Bierens de Haan 159, Wellcome II, 99, Thorndike VIII, 618 f.: "The Pyrosophia includes a picture of Barchusen's laboratory at Utrecht as well as plates illustrating chemical apparatus". DSB 1, 451. - Not in Duveen. - Rare and early edition of this work (Ferchl nent another edition of 1696 and a second of 1698). - "The pyrosophia is a formal, systematic textbook that deals with the principles of chemistry, both theoretical and practical and then attempts to demonstrate their applications to natural philosophy, medicine, @etallurgy, and alchemy. The bulk of the work is descriptive, preparative iatrochernistry of a conventional type; but the syllabi of laboratory courses for 1695 to 1697, included as an appendix to the volume, show an increasing tendency to emphasize chemistry as the an-alysis and synthesis of bodies by fire, relegating the preparative iatrochemistry to a secondary part of the course. All the syllabi contain sections devoted to metalltirgical assay and to alchemy. In this last part, the students were shown how most alleged transmutations could be explained in terms of displacement reactions of metals." (DSB). - Some foxing and browning. (1500).