(such as it may be) may by being abstracted from compound Bodies, whether Mineral, Animal, or Vegetable, leave them more unlockt than a wary Naturalist would easily beleeve, that I dare not confidently measure the Power of Nature and Art by that of the Menstruums, and other Instruments that eminent Chymists themselves are as yet wont to Empoly about the Analyzing of Bodies; nor Deny that a Menstruum may at least from this or that particular Concrete obtain some apparently similar Substance, differing from any obtainable from the same Body by any degree or manner of Application of the Fire. And I am the more backward to deny peremptorily, that there may be such Openers of compound Bodies, because among the Experiments that make me speak thus warily, there wanted not some in which it appear’d not, that one of the Substances not separable by common Fires and Menstruums could retain any thing of the Salt by which the separation was made.
And here, Eleutherius, (sayes Carneades) I should conclude as much of my Discourse as belongs to the first Con-
