describes himself as a Helvetian and a German. He was born in the year 1493, following the tradition which is most generally accepted, but other dates have been indicated, the earliest being 1490. According to one account he was descended from the ancient and honourable family of Bombast, which had abode during many generations at the castle of Hohenheim, near Stuttgart, Würtemberg, but this is most probably romancing. His father was a physician of repute, who is said to have been in possession of a large collection of curious books, and has also been described as a grand master of the Teutonic order, but the precise meaning attaching to this high-sounding dignity is uncertain and the authority is suspicious. His mother is variously identified as the matron of a hospital and "superintendent of the university of Einsiedeln." Paracelsus is reputed to have been their only child, born one year after marriage, but it has also been hinted that his parents were not married, and that the great master of Hermetic medicine was a natural son. He is said also to have been emasculated in his childhood, but there is reason to suppose that this was merely a hypothetical explanation to account for his beardless and somewhat feminine appearance, and for that hatred of women which seems to have been one of his social characteristics, and can be traced indirectly, but with sufficient distinctness, in his writings.[1] About 1502 the family removed to Carinthia, and there the father continued to practise medicine till his death in 1534. From him Paracelsus is supposed to have received the first rudiments of education, and he entered the university of Basle at the age of sixteen, when he betook himself to the study of alchemy, surgery, and medicine. To the first of these sciences he had previously had some introduction through the works of Isaac the Hollander, which are said to have inflamed him with the ambition of curing diseases by medicine superior to the materia at that time in use. It was from the same source that he derived the cardinal principle which is enunciated everywhere in his writings, namely, that salt, sulphur, and mercury are the three elementary constituents of all substances. This doctrine, however, by no means originated with the first alchemist of Holland, and Isaac himself was a follower of Geber, Morien, and Arnold.[2] The actual initiation of Paracelsus into the mysteries of alchemy is, however, supposed to have been attained under the
- ↑ So free was Paracelsus of all amourous weaknesses, that he made even his sex seem doubtful.—Dogme de la Haute Magie, c. 11.
- ↑ Contemporary with Basilius Valentinus were Isaac the Hollander and his son, who are supposed to have worked with success. They were the first alchemists of Holland, and their operations were highly esteemed by Paracelsus, Boyle, and Kunckel. In practical chemistry they followed the traditions of Geber, and their alchemical experiments are the most plain and explicit in the whole range of Hermetic literature. They worked principally in metals, describing minutely the particulars of every process. Their lives are almost unknown. . . . They are placed in the fifteenth century by conjecture, from the fact that they do not cite any philosophers subsequent to that period. They speak of Geber, Dastin, Morien, and Arnold, but not of more modern authorities, while, on the other hand, their references to aquafortis and aqua regia, which were discovered in the fourteenth century, prevent us from assigning their labours to an anterior epoch. The two Isaacs were particularly skilful in the manufacture of enamels and artificial gem stones. They taught that the Grand Magisterium could convert a million times its own weight into gold, and declared that any person taking weekly a small portion of the philosophical stone will be ever preserved in perfect health, and his life will be prolonged to the very last hour which God has assigned to him.—Lives of Alchemystical Philosophers.
