Treatise on the Salt of the Philosophers by Francesco Maria Pompey Colonna

 

This text, dated 1652, once again directs the reader toward metals as the ore in which to seek the raw material destined for the creation of the Philosopher's Stone. However, the author drops, for those who are discerning, a particularly suggestive detail about this material—a clue that, due to its nature, I prefer not to elaborate on here.

The work adopts the classic form of a philosophical dialogue: two alchemists converse, and through their questions and answers, various aspects of the process are clarified, always based on the principles of nature. This literary device, so valued by the ancients, allows the author to gradually progress from the doubts of the beginner to the certainties of the experienced philosopher.

In the course of the conversation, the motif of the numerous veils that shroud Hermetic literature is also revealed. The deliberate deceptions of the artists—intended to preserve secrecy—are revealed here like a faint but perceptible sunlight filtering through a sky heavy with clouds.

Thus, the treatise suggests a fundamental idea of ​​natural philosophy: that the invisible exerts its influence on the visible, and that from this secret correspondence arises the generation so longed for by the practitioner of the Art.

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