Sten Lindroth, Paracelsism in Sweden until the mid-17th Century
Introduction
[p. 11] One of the most essential problems in the history of knowledge concerns the breakthrough of modern natural science. Although long-prepared, this breakthrough came to characterize the scientific and intellectual life of the 17th century. The obstacles that had to be overcome were significant. Orthodoxy and the conservative mindset stood in the way of the revolution in question. Although the course of events was complicated, it is permissible to simplify by focusing on scholastic philosophy as the main opposition that the new scientists had to defeat. This scholasticism was not a uniform entity; however, in its adherence to Aristotelian thought, it was conservative in nature. Consequently, the emergence of the new science was largely shaped as a struggle against Aristotelian scholasticism. The dismantling of the conservative worldview became to some extent the most important element in the liberation process that culminated in a new natural science and a new worldview. Many forces were at play; among the most significant, we can consider Paracelsism.
Paracelsism, at least in its founder's intentions, was revolutionary. It aimed to crush scholastic learning and build another, better science. However, it was by no means devoid of roots in the past. Its connections to ancient and medieval literature are many and evident, though ultimately inadequately explored. The science that Paracelsism thus continued was to some extent 'mystical'; it did not engage with the rationalist methods of the established scholasticism. The Neoplatonic tradition and its branches in various occult thoughts during the Middle Ages are one of the preconditions for Paracelsism's natural doctrine. In the religiously-oriented late antique treatises attributed to the mythical Hermes Trismegistus, an esoteric wisdom was concealed, which could advantageously be played against the official knowledge of the day; this was particularly the case within later Paracelsism to such an extent that Paracelsism in some places became synonymous with Hermetic science. In medieval alchemy, with its combination of practical laboratory work and spiritualistic religiosity, Paracelsus and his followers had yet another starting point, [p. 12] perhaps the most important one. It is clear from these hints that Paracelsism represented a mindset that fundamentally differed from the spirit expressed in the experimental natural science that emerged around the same time and for which the future was reserved. Paracelsism played an incredibly important role, particularly in the first half of the 17th century, in several seemingly disparate areas. To some extent, it had succeeded in achieving the desired revolution. However, the lasting results did not match the influence it undoubtedly had during its peak period.
This is not to say that the real "significance" of Paracelsism lay solely in its polemics, its criticism of Aristotelianism, and, within medicine, Galenism. The following overview will show that the work of the Paracelsists was of extraordinary importance, especially for the emergence of modern chemistry and for a rather radical reorientation of medicine towards more fruitful problems, partly determined by the chemical view of nature. Additionally, there are the equally obvious yet complex connections that link the Paracelsian spirit, its scientific enthusiasm, and utopian pathos, with the exact and inductive research of the time.
These perspectives are merely hinted at here. The main point remains that Paracelsism, as it actually emerged, played a significant role in scientific life for more than a century (let's say from 1560 to 1700). This contribution raises many questions of the greatest historical interest.
The man who gave rise to the movement we describe here, Theophrastus Paracelsus, was born in 1493 and died in 1541. He was feverishly active as a practicing physician and writer on various subjects. Under often quite difficult conditions—he led a restless wandering life in Switzerland and southern Germany—he recorded his thoughts on medicine, physics, anthropology, and religion in numerous treatises, often of considerable length. Filled with a burning pathos, he saw himself as a reformer, even in his inspired moments as a messianic savior, who would overthrow the official falsehoods in schools and academies to fundamentally build a new natural science and a new art of healing. There is a tremendous force behind his diatribes against scholastic learning, often heightened to excess; Paracelsus did not want to make any concessions, he was a man who took everything to the extreme. The same unwavering love for the pointed expression characterizes the science he wanted to establish in place of the one he overthrew. With a strength that must be admired, Paracelsus follows his thoughts to their conclusion. However, naïve in his disposition, he cares little for coherence or a well-thought-out system; one [p. 13] often has to laboriously piece together the Paracelsian doctrine from his writings, extracting it from the often confusing, yet often brilliantly concise expressions. Contradictions in Paracelsus' works are countless (a shift in opinions over the years also played a part); he always seems to write raptim, full of confidence in his own intuitive ability to strike at the truth. And yet, there is no doubt about the internal unity in Paracelsus' seemingly chaotic works at first glance. The rare vitality it possessed is proof enough. One does not inspire philosophy and science for several generations with mere lucky ideas and brilliant slogans. Paracelsism was, from the beginning, a worldview, indeed a system, without the formal characteristics of a system but with its vast scope and unlimited validity. This precisely accounted for its remarkable success—here was offered a replacement for scholasticism's encyclopedic philosophia peripatetica. Indeed, Paracelsus had left succeeding generations more than just a doctrine; he had bequeathed a unique perspective, a general mindset that had a significant explosive effect and eventually came to exert its influence far beyond the circles of Paracelsian doctrinarians.
An overview of Paracelsus' teachings can advantageously start from his general conception of nature, the Paracelsian holistic view of the macrocosm; here, something of the most characteristic features of this philosophy is revealed. Paracelsus and Paracelsism always stood very close to nature; it was regarded as a great and wonderful realm, filled with divine powers: "thus the magnalia of God and his mysteria are great and wonderfully to be recognized." This view of nature was poetic, religious, vastly different from the strictly logical physics of scholasticism; its historical preconditions lay in Neoplatonic, Hermetic, and alchemistic literature, in their conceptions of the universe as a harmonious and ensouled whole. Paracelsus regarded nature as a spiritual reality; in the bodily shells lay hidden invisible forces, and this invisible realm was what mattered solely to the philosopher. With a multitude of terms, Paracelsus seeks to denote the forces in the invisible natura naturans: arcana, mysteria, Vulcanus, ares, and especially archeus. He also uses a unified term for the invisible world; it is "das gestirn," the realm of the stars, the inner firmament. Every body carries within it a firmament-like power ("where there is an elemental body, there is also a firmament-like quality"); in this strange star realm lies the reason of things, all wisdom, and all art. This reorientation of astrological concepts becomes of extraordinary importance in Paracelsus' writings; but at the same time, this "gestirn" concept is very difficult to interpret without contradiction. Here, Paracelsus stands outside any form of empirical natural research, completely captivated by the sage's intuitive vision.
[p. 14] The natural philosophy that Paracelsus develops from these foundations has its emphasis on the doctrine of elements and principles. Aristotelian scholasticism taught that the four elements—earth, water, air, and fire, characterized by certain elemental qualities—formed the sublunary things through mutual mixing, mixtio. Paracelsus denies this. Elements cannot mix with each other; they are "separated in their state," unified cosmic regions that, like mothers, produce 'fruits' of their own nature. Therefore, each thing consists of only one element. Each element consequently has a generative force that brings forth things, the invisible element, the soul of the element; "thus there are four souls or spirits." This is the aforementioned doctrine of the invisible nature in a new formulation. The stars, "das gestirn," actually have their dwelling in the elements; "what is an element, that is also a star." As a consequence of this view, Paracelsus rejects the role that Aristotelians attributed to the four elemental qualities in the generation of things. He understands this process primarily as a spiritual one; "the secret" (arcanum) acts, "not the cold."
Another deviation from the accepted doctrine that garnered much attention was Paracelsus’ exclusion of fire from the number of elements ("for it gives nothing elemental to man, gives nothing of fruits"). In its place, he positioned the sky as a fourth element; this highest elemental region he believed, inspired by Stoic and Hermetic philosophy, consisted of fire, but not the earthly fire, rather a nobler and life-giving fire, which truly had its 'fruits,' the stars. With this, the Aristotelian dogma of the sky as a non-elemental and imperishable quintessence was eradicated.
As these hints have made clear, the elements primarily had a spiritual function. Their outer shells, the world of elemental bodies, therefore—Paracelsus argues—must have specific material principles. These were the later so renowned three chemical substances, salt, sulfur, and mercury (which were only later explicitly called principles). In medieval alchemy, a theory was put forward, primarily in the works attributed to the Arab Geber, according to which metals were composed of sulfur and mercury, which in turn contained the four elements. Paracelsus, who was essentially educated in the alchemical worldview, develops and transforms this idea. He adds salt as a third principle, and he lets this chemical theory apply to all natural things without exception, all the fruits of the elements; even the sky and its bodies are in this way salt, sulfur, and mercury. The entire visible world is composed of these three. Through the combustion of things, their properties are revealed. It turns out that sulfur represents the principle of combustibility itself, mercury the liquid (liquor), and salt finally the solid, the ash, hardness ("all congelation, coagulation comes [p. 15] from salt"). The three substances are therefore not identical with the commonly known substances bearing the same names but correspond to certain conditions in matter; they signify the basic forms of primordial matter and constitute, as such, the bodies of the elements by being 'transferred into the nature of the four mothers.' They are thus in the truest sense tria prima. Paracelsus reverses the earlier alchemical theory, in which the elements were retained as the material building blocks. In his view, the chemical substances have taken over the role that the elements played in Aristotelian natural philosophy. Certain obscurities indeed accompany this new and radical physics; but it undoubtedly represents a grand attempt to implement a chemical explanation of nature, where the material world is interpreted in terms of an empirical laboratory science.
Paracelsus also devoted his speculation to cosmogony. His description of these matters gives us an opportunity to vividly study the natural philosophy whose main features have just been outlined. The universe originated from the primordial body that God created in the beginning. According to Paracelsus, it was a chaos where all unformed bodies lay, a unity of force and matter that he calls yliaster (mysterium magnum in the probably apocryphal Philosophia ad Athenienses); in this thoroughly Peripatetic doctrine of matter as a truly existing primordial principle, Paracelsus follows ancient cosmogony, Hermetic philosophy, and medieval alchemy, where speculations about the chaos preceding things played a significant role. The chaotic primordial body was, from the beginning, tripartite, i.e., it contained the principles of corporeality: salt, sulfur, and mercury ("these three are prima materia, they have only one name"). During the six days of creation, God, in alchemical work, extracted the multitude of things from the chaotic mass, first the elements as four mighty bodies, then in extractions and separations, the individual things from the mother-elements.
Paracelsus' doctrine of humanity, its nature and activity, cannot be separated from his natural philosophy. He always strives to view humans as a part of the great world, with the task of exploring it, revealing the hidden, the 'invisible' nature, by interpreting it. This must be done according to God's command: "for God is marvelous in his works and creations, who, without end, has wonderfully commanded man, as the noblest creature, to philosophize about everything himself and to explore nature, so that he may reveal the wonders of God." Thus, humanity holds extraordinary significance in the great cosmic contexts. Paracelsus is, in general, captivated by the grandeur and rare perfection of humanity; he aligns with the apotheoses of the dignity of man that were particularly embraced in Florentine Platonism by Ficino and Pico della Mirandola. This nobility of humanity has [p. 16] another of its prerequisites in its "composition." As a microcosm, man encompasses within himself the entire great world, the macrocosm. This doctrine of man as a summary of creation, long prevalent especially in Platonizing circles, is taken to its ultimate consequences by Paracelsus. All external things exist within man: "in him grows all fruit that grows in the world, grass and other things...". The external and the internal, the world and man, says Paracelsus, are one thing, a constellation, an influence. For man, the son of the universe, was created from the great world, from a slime-like mass that was a quintessence of the macrocosm; this was the Mosaic text's limus terrae. These circumstances indicate that the world's composition of visible and invisible, corporeal and astral ("gestirn"), must be repeated in man; he consists of an elemental body and a siderial body; in addition, there is the soul, given directly by God and immortal, "the spirit of the image." This tripartite, entirely non-scholastic doctrine of man, which Paracelsus developed mainly in his anthropological main work Philosophia sagax, has a rich history in Platonizing literature. Particularly important were the Hermetic writings (Poimandres, Asclepius); there, man is conceived as a union of the divine (mens, nous) and the corporeal, with mens as a mantle enveloping the soul (anima), which in turn is connected to the body by the spirit (spiritus).
Paracelsus' version of these ideas is original, especially in his doctrine of the siderial man. Just as the inner stars of the great world are conceived as the principles of reason and ingenious actions, Paracelsus places all natural knowledge and wisdom, all arts, including the essential 'natural light' for his doctrine of knowledge, within the siderial man. Note, he says, "that the true man is the constellation ... that is invisible and intangible in the body, that is the light of nature, the natural wisdom, which God has given into the sidus and from the sidus into man." Thus, man's star body is a concentrate of all natural wisdom. This doctrine would also have consequences for Paracelsus' attitude towards astrology. He did not doubt that astral influence is crucial for human life. But this influence primarily emanates from man's own stars, his inner heaven; "for as much as the ascendant of heaven can achieve, so much can man achieve." The stars of the outer heaven have no power over him; Mars, for example, operates only if a martial star exists within man. Even if Paracelsus' liberation from astrological fatalism has been greatly exaggerated, his attitude in these matters, through his microcosmic view of man, has acquired a peculiar form.
Paracelsus' thinking is filled with religious feeling. The divine force [p. 17] permeates the universe. Paracelsus also dedicated a significant part of his writings to the problems of the church and Christianity; during the 1530s, he wrote several theological treatises, many of which remain unpublished. Inspired by medieval mysticism, oppositional Spiritualism, and its ideals of poverty, he fiercely opposed the Catholic Church, its pompous formalism, and hierarchical order. He condemned ceremonies and idol worship; nothing should stand between man and the things "that come from heaven." Christianity can only endure in the Christian life, in heartfelt faith, poverty, and following Christ. Such a way of life is indeed possible. Paracelsus was imbued with spiritualistic views. His theory of knowledge is characterized by this; the divine force, he believed, inspires the wise in their contemplation of nature's mysteries. This spiritualism is also the core of his theology. Man can be deified already in this life, leaving the Adamic; Christ dwells in us "so that we may be heavenly." Christ's own imperishable nature—Paracelsus also connects to the Gnostic notion of Jesus' body as 'heavenly'—is imparted to the saved person. All who are truly Christian in this way form, without any forms and external practices, a real ecclesia spiritualis, an 'inner' church distinct from the papacy's official "Maurkirche." Thus, the fundamental thoughts of spiritualistic faith are powerfully expressed in Paracelsus. He is partly carried by the same pathos as Luther (whom he deeply despised); this struggle against orthodoxy and formalism is, however, entirely his own affair, a hallmark of his entire endeavor within science and religion.
Paracelsus was primarily a practitioner. His goal was to master and simultaneously serve nature through ingenious arts; he wanted to understand its essence to drive it to work. This is achieved through the magical arts that occupy such a broad place in Paracelsus' writings. Medieval occultism has in him, as in his contemporary Agrippa, a worthy heir; the magic Paracelsus practices is essentially a natural magic, an art that exploits the invisible nature where all forces reside. The natural art, which Paracelsus loved greatly, was nevertheless medicine. He was first and foremost a physician; the suffering of humanity was his field of work, and the knowledge of nature was for him above all a necessary prerequisite for medicine, because, as he develops particularly in Paragranum, man-the-microcosm can only be interpreted in her essence with the help of the great world, her father. The nobility of the medical calling was extraordinary for Paracelsus; "for he [the physician] has completed his day with the arcana and has lived in God and in nature as a mighty master of the earthly light." It was primarily as a reformer of the art of healing that Paracelsus wanted to be seen. For the old medicine had to be overthrown; it was an imperative necessity for him.
[p. 18] The prevailing art of healing, from which Paracelsus turned away in disgust, was the scholastic medicine, particularly based on the teachings of Galen and systematized by, among others, the Arab Avicenna. Paracelsus drastically declared that these two were far surpassed in learning by his shoe buckles ("my shoe buckles are more learned than your Galen and Avicenna"). The perception within this orthodox medicine about the nature of diseases was characterized by logical order and abstract acumen. It was based on the theory that the human body was composed of the four elements. These elements manifested in a tangible form in the four bodily humors. Irregularities in these humors were the source of diseases; one or more of the humors could quantitatively dominate, or a qualitative anomaly could occur, a shift in their elemental qualities. These disturbances, in turn, led to the body or any of its parts becoming warmer, colder, etc., than normal (distemperament). The altered humors then affected and changed the qualities that formed the body's 'temperament.' Thus, in Galenism, disease is understood as an unnatural condition, an affectus præter naturam.
Paracelsus vigorously opposed these notions. "All the errors and falsehoods of medicine have arisen from the four humors." The four qualities (cold, hot, wet, dry) have no significance for disease. For Paracelsus, disease is something real, not just a condition but an actual substance, and in his naive vitalism, it appears as an independent being, a 'person' ("know... that every disease is a complete person"). The stars of the microcosmic heaven, explains Paracelsus, forge diseases. He often regards them as plants, "thus are also sown diseases in man"; diseases arise from seeds, they are ex seminibus, as he particularly shows in Labyrinthus medicorum (1537/38).
To further characterize the nature of diseases, Paracelsus employs a chemical perspective; the important Opus Paramirum (1531) is the essential source here. Diseases come from salt, sulfur, or mercury, "there lie the origins of all diseases." This happens when any of the chemical substances undergoes 'exaltation,' a transformation according to the recognized processes of alchemy: distillation, sublimation, etc. Various causes initiate this destructive development, especially—as hinted earlier—inner astral influences ("the invisible operation of the firmament"). Each of the chemical principles thus generates its specific harms. In this respect, Paracelsus' pathology is merely a rewriting of Galenism's humor theories in chemical language, but this was significant enough—and with his doctrine of the organic nature of disease, he completely broke with the established views.
Paracelsus' pathology offers many interesting, though also troublesome, problems. [p. 19] He sometimes develops motifs that are difficult to integrate into his general theories. Of particular importance was the concept of tartaric diseases, to which he devoted several writings. Tartaric diseases, he believed, were formed from the 'excrements' of drink and food, the impurities of nourishment; if they are not separated in the human stomach but enter the body, they coagulate by its salting (spiritus salis) and cause a multitude of painful stone diseases; the formation of tartar on the walls of wine barrels is the process that Paracelsus had in mind. He had also developed an early, only partially completed pathology in the early Volumen Paramirum, where he identified five entities that 'nourish all diseases'; they were ens astrale, the toxic, chemical influences of the stars, ens veneni, destructive, likewise chemically determinable components in food, ens naturale, described as the lifespan of the microcosmic nature, ens spirituale, the power emanating from the evil will of man, and ens Dei, God's supernatural action.
Paracelsus' pathology generally remained confined to a narrow circle of followers. His therapy marked a contribution of greater significance. Here too, he broke with Galenism. According to Galenism, healing agents primarily worked through their qualities. Medicines—essentially herbal remedies composed in extensive compositions—were used according to the rule contraria contrariis; if the disease or its cause, the humor, was a distemperament in warmth, cooling medicaments were used, etc. Often, it was necessary to expel the materia peccans (the humors) through bloodletting or purging; purgative remedies were believed to work through certain occult qualities. Paracelsus sought to overturn these doctrines. Disease, being an independent, almost spiritual substance, could be subdued only by a spirit ("therefore, spirit should be used against spirit"), an arcanum, which is the astral power of the medicament and unbound by all 'qualities'; blessed and more than blessed, exclaims Paracelsus, is the physician who knows that the medicine is alive and not dead! These arcana, according to Paracelsus, were of the same nature as the disease, they had the same 'anatomy,' a magical "concordance" with the disease; mercury cures mercury, melissa cures melissa, etc. In every natural thing, good and evil lie side by side; the good in the thing, its arcanum, cures the disease caused by its evil influence. Thus, inspired by Hermetic sympathy doctrine, Paracelsus embraces a therapy according to the rule similia similibus. To the same conceptual circle belongs the doctrine of signatures, which he lovingly embraced. The similarity, the common 'anatomy,' was already evident in the external form of the medicines, particularly herbs; they were signed, for the insightful physician's aid.
However, the healing, spiritual arcana did not exist as such in nature. They had to be [p. 20] prepared by the physician, and this was done through fire, through alchemy. Arcanum was the astral essence of the thing, which remains after the 'body' has been removed; 'only the soul shall remain.' This separatio puri ab impuro (separation of the pure from the impure) occurs through distillations, sublimations, etc. — "thus learn what alchemy is, to recognize that it alone, through fire, makes the impure pure." This chemical — as he himself called it, spagyric — pharmacology was pursued by Paracelsus with peculiar consistency, but it is incorrect to consider it entirely his own contribution; already during the Middle Ages, a doctrine was developed about the preparation of medicines through distillations, a quintessence pharmacology, which was clearly presented in Rupescissa's De consideratione quintæ essentiæ (circa 1345) and propagated simultaneously with Paracelsus in several distillation books by Brunschwig, Ulstadius, and others. The same applies to a certain extent to the other characteristic feature of Paracelsus' pharmacopoeia: its mineral materia medica. Paracelsus drew his arcana from all classes of the natural kingdom but showed particular interest in mineral remedies. From substances such as gold, mercury, salt, tartarus, vitriol, and especially antimony, he prepared their healing essences through alchemical purification processes; he referred to these as magisterium, spiritus, crocus, elixir, etc. He also had predecessors in this direction, particularly within alchemy; nevertheless, Paracelsus' combination of chemical preparation and mineral materia was of immense significance for the future. This put him in opposition to orthodox Galenism, which primarily used vegetable (and animal) remedies, often in their natural form. Paracelsus wanted to free the art of healing from its 'soup-cooking.' And to a large extent, he succeeded.
Paracelsus' vigorous efforts to transform the sciences had no immediate impact. He was a comet-like phenomenon, of rare brilliance, and for a time it seemed that development would continue unaffected by his contribution. Most and the most important of his writings remained unpublished for the time being. The actual resurrection occurred in the 1560s. Then, a first generation of devoted Paracelsists emerged, whose immediate task was to publish the master's works for the general public. An eager editorial activity began; notable contributions in this regard were made particularly by Adam von Bodenstein in Basel, the itinerant and somewhat restless Michael Toxites, and especially the Belgian Gerard Dorn; all three also sought to assist their mission with lexicons of Paracelsus' often obscure terms and meanings. At the same time, this renaissance spread beyond the borders of Germany; in France, one of its first representatives was the [p. 21] Parisian mathematician Jacques Gohory, who in 1567, under the pseudonym Leo Svavius, published a commented edition of Paracelsus' De vita longa (Theophrasti Paracelsi philosophice et medicina compendium). With these names also begins the further development of Paracelsus' teachings, Paracelsism as a living movement that constantly changes, absorbs related views, and influences European thought to an extent that almost matched the master's own self-conscious dreams. In the introductions to the editions, people often sought the opportunity to independently address Paracelsian questions. Gerard Dorn, in particular, also had a significant authorship alongside this, which is especially interesting because Paracelsism there is combined with a spiritualistic view inspired by alchemical and Pythagorean ideas. His writings, Monarchia physica, Clavis totius philosophiae chymisticae, and others, represent an orientation towards theosophy that heralds a characteristic development of Paracelsism in general. The same orientation also significantly characterizes the apocrypha that now began to circulate and be printed under Paracelsus' name; gold-making, Kabbalism, and all sorts of other occultism are encountered in them, though the question of their authenticity and nature is not at all clarified.
From the 1560s onward, Paracelsism gained ground with extraordinary speed. Already in 1571, a remarkable attempt was made to outline the new philosophical medicine in a grandly conceived systematic presentation; it was with the Danish physician Petrus Severinus (Sorensen, died 1602) and his Idea medicinae philosophicae, completed in Florence in 1570 and printed the following year. This work must undoubtedly be regarded as the most important and influential in all Paracelsian literature. Severinus takes his starting point in Paracelsus' writings, but he reinterprets and systematizes them in a Platonizing spirit. His cosmology, deeply poetic in nature, deals with Paracelsian concepts, albeit with great freedom. The invisible natura naturans is also for him the only important thing. It consists of the incorporeal four elements, which are "loca, matrices, domicilia" for the seeds or stars (semina s. astra) placed in them by the creator; these are the inner cores of things, eternal and imperishable, their ideas. This strange realm of spirits with its invisible elements and countless stars must, however, leave its hidden depths and appear "on the mundane scene." This occurs through a union with the principles of corporeality: salt, sulfur, and mercury; but this process, Severinus believes, involves 'an unfortunate marriage'—for his Platonic view sees this event as a fall from the sweet rest in eternity, the truly existing.
Severinus' doctrine of disease likewise represents a development of Paracelsian teachings. He starts from the master's organic pathology; in polemic against Galenism but with frequent reference to Hippocrates, he shows how diseases [p. 22] grow in man, they come from seeds ("morbos in Natura semina habere"), vital principles with specific tasks and peculiarities, which the divine curse poured over creation after the fall of the first man; they are characterized above all by their chemical nature. Thus, in the generation of disease, "a true principle, full of power and strength, operates, capable of accomplishing something, having knowledge, definite tasks and obligations, essence, life, and properties."
Severinus' work is a milestone in the history of Paracelsism. The "Severian Paracelsism" left a profound mark on subsequent literature. This is especially noticeable within cosmology. A remarkable work in this context was written by the most important representative of French Paracelsism, Josephus Quercetanus, physician to Henry IV (died 1609); it was titled Ad veritatem Hermetica medicina responsio (printed 1604). Quercetanus' treatment of natural things is built on the Dane's Platonizing Paracelsism; the incorporeal elements, stars, and chemical principles leave their spiritual state and transform into the bodies of the sensory world, becoming "materially clothed." Significant was Quercetanus' — still inspired by Severinus — belief that the elements form bodies through their union (mixtio). Thus, he departs from Paracelsus' doctrine of the pure element regions and introduces an Aristotelian line of thought. In the detailed formulation of this theory, however, he is original; he believes that only two elements—water (phlegma) and earth (terra damnata)—can be distinguished in things, which also include the three chemical principles. Thus, bodies consist of five things demonstrable through chemical analysis; in salt, sulfur, and mercury, Quercetanus explains, like a good Paracelsist, all active properties lie, they are "comme Princes doués de pouvoir et de force" (Le grand miroir du monde 1584); the importance that Aristotelians attributed to the elemental qualities is, here as elsewhere in Paracelsism, denied.
Several researchers adhered to the original Paracelsism, among them Oswald Crollius, a physician at the court in Anhalt-Bernburg (died 1609). In his famous Basilica chymica (1608), he included an extensive preface which serves as an excellent introduction to the main questions of Paracelsism; not without polemics against Severinus, he refers to the genuinely Paracelsian view: elements are not comparable with principles but are unified cosmic regions, constructed from principles. But the revision carried out by Severinus and Quercetanus gained general ground; especially in French chemistry, the doctrine of the five fundamental substances of things (water, earth, salt, sulfur, and mercury) became a cornerstone of research during the 17th century. The material doctrine of genuine Paracelsism was also transformed in other ways. Severinus and his followers believed that elements built things through mixtio; however, the chemical principles were considered [p. 23] independent substances. Gradually, however, the view that the principles themselves were also composed of elements gained followers. Salt, sulfur, and mercury were thus not, as Paracelsus taught, prime principles but should be considered as prima mixta. This theory was apparently developed already in the 16th century (Dorn) and found a representative in the mythical Basilius Valentinus, under whose name a number of very imaginative and widely read alchemical treatises were published from 1599 onwards. By the beginning of the 17th century, it was fairly widespread. Efforts were made (by Sendivogius, Nollius) to determine which elements constituted each principle, how sulfur was formed from fire and water, etc. This revised Paracelsism found a particularly influential representative in the distinguished Daniel Sennert (died 1637), professor of medicine at Wittenberg University; in an excellent work that clarifies various controversial subjects, De chymicorum cum Aristotelicis et Galenicis consensu ac dissensu (1619), he presents his opinion on the compound nature of the principles ("I do not deny that elements contribute to their constitution; as this is confirmed by chemical resolution"). Sennert essentially stood on scholastic grounds, just as the principle theory in this form represents a compromise with Aristotelian views. In examining the Swedish material, we will return to these questions. They are of central importance in the chemical discussions of the time; this discussion is primarily upheld by the Paracelsists, who deserve credit for the vibrant work within analytical chemistry that characterizes the early 17th century; the terms chemist and Paracelsist are now often used synonymously.
Paracelsian physics continued to spread throughout the 17th century. The chemical problem-solving approach is somewhat characteristic of the direction's representatives, but other motifs are also highly prevalent. Paracelsism naturally allied itself with related non-scholastic currents. The Hermetic writings, alchemy, the Platonizing philosophy in general, such as it was shaped in the 16th-century Italian natural philosophy, offered ideas for new attempts to find an explanation of nature that seemed more satisfactory than Aristotelian scholasticism; they were carried by the same spirit as Paracelsism, and in several quite significant thinkers from the first half of the 17th century, we find comprehensive world explanations where different lines of thought in this undogmatic, "Hermetic," physics are summarized. Paracelsism sometimes played a subordinate role, but nonetheless, a depiction of its history should not overlook these authors; they emerged from the same conditions, driven by the same pathos as Paracelsism—we are dealing with a whole that, not least in its opposition to Aristotelianism, is quite indivisible. Notable representatives of a Hermeticism oriented more or less towards Paracelsism were, in this way, men such as the [p. 24] French, entirely unknown alchemist Jean d’Espagnet (Enchiridion physicae restitutae 1623), the English physician and mystic Robert Fludd (died 1637; Utriusque cosmi historia 1617 and Philosophia Moysaica 1638), the great educator and pansophist Johann Amos Comenius (died 1670; Physica ad lumen divinum reformata synopsis 1633), and further the well-known Belgian physician Johannes Baptista van Helmont (died 1644), the most inspired by Paracelsism among the authors mentioned here. These Hermeticists and other like-minded individuals often closely align with one another. They were particularly captivated by cosmogonic questions and sought to depict the creation of the cosmos from nothing in grand schemes; they showed how the chaotic primordial matter was ordered and formed under the influence of one or more active principles (lux or lux and spiritus, etc.). Platonic idealism and Hermetic cosmology characterized these teachings, but particularly notable was the orientation towards Mosaic explanations of the world. They believed they could discern the constitutive principles of the universe in Moses' account of creation. This philosophia Mosaica, which we will return to later, played an extremely significant role in this camp; they believed that, under the authority of the Bible, they were constructing a purely Christian explanation of the world, inherently of higher value than the pagan Aristotle's physics. However, they also emphasized that Moses' teachings remarkably aligned with Hermetic views, the philosophy revealed by Hermes Trismegistus, as well as with other ancient thinkers, Zoroaster, Pythagoras, Plato, etc. This theory of a philosophia perennis, a true and pure primordial philosophy common to the wise men of antiquity (it is also hinted at in Paracelsus), forms a characteristic element in the Hermeticists' and Paracelsists' efforts to explain the macrocosm and its essence.
The Paracelsists were generally physicians, and Paracelsus' revolution in medicine became for them the starting point for further research. In this regard, Severinus' Idea medicinæ philosophicæ generally gained normative significance. Its influence is particularly noticeable in pathology; opposing Galen's humoral theories, they developed in various ways, especially two motifs advanced by Paracelsus and systematized by Severinus: the doctrine of diseases as independent, power-endowed substances and the theory of their chemical nature, dependent on the body's salt, sulfur, and mercury. In these fundamental views, they sought to incorporate, among other things, the tartaric interpretation of diseases, which was generally considered very important.
Thus, disease was generally understood as arising from irregularities in the chemical principles, "a temperie sua aut aliorum consortio excurrentia" [p. 25] (Quercetanus). The stars and invisible spirits of the three principles, says Crollius in typically Paracelsian terms, are the mechanics and manufacturers of diseases. The most consistent application of this view can perhaps be found in Henningus Scheunemannus, a physician in Halberstadt; in his Medicina reformata seu denarius Hermeticus (1617), he shows how the principles—appearing in a total of ten forms, such as mercurius pneumosus, sulphur resolutum, etc.—constitute the roots, stars, or seeds for all diseases as soon as they change or their unity dissolves. Each of the ten forms causes specific diseases; for example, apoplexy arises from mercurius cremosus and the tartaric ailments from sal resolutum; in iatrochemistry, in the teachings of de le Boë Sylvius, these Paracelsian theories would reach further development. These hints have already indicated that this chemical pathology is intimately connected with the vitalist view. Diseases are formed from chemically determinable 'seeds' or 'stars'; these are, explains the well-known German Paracelsist Henricus Nollius in Physica Hermetica (1619), sulfuric, salty, or mercurial and are either fixed in the body since birth or introduced later with nourishment ("semina morborum partim cum semine homini implantata sunt, partim cum Elementis et alimentis in corpus recipiuntur"). The ontological doctrine of disease was particularly emphasized by van Helmont. In Ortus medicinae, the collected edition of his writings (published 1648), he develops his view on pathological problems. Disease is not merely a state of the body or an abstract quality but a real being; thus, there is an apoplectic being, a leprous being, etc. These disease substances are formed in the body's vital principle, its archeus, of which Helmont distinguishes one for each organ; "morbus a confusionibus ac perturbationibus impuri Archei prodiit." This happens by the formation of a disease's idea, a idea seminalis for the disease, in the archeus—the Platonic view plays a significant role here, as often in this literature.
The Paracelsists' therapy developed the essential ideas of Paracelsus as hinted above. It was about uprooting the core of the disease, its seed and root, with particularly powerful remedies, "vitalibus et potentibus remedijs, morbos illos radicales, in corpore ex semine prognatos, auferre" (Severinus). Therefore, invisible, spiritual means of an arcanum nature, filled with astral power, were required. The medicaments believed to possess this miraculous effect were primarily mineral substances in chemical preparation. Through the spagyric arts, the pure was separated from the impure, producing healing essences from materials such as antimony, mercury, vitriol, etc. Quercetanus showed how the chemical art prepares the finest medicament from the most toxic thing by extracting its celestial power (extractio caelestium essentiarum ac formarum). In nature, [p. 26] says the English Paracelsist Thomas Moufet in De iure et praeconstantia chymicorum medicamentorum (1584), there is nothing so toxic that it cannot be made drinkable after a 'fixation in fire'.
This revolution of the pharmacopoeia initiated by Paracelsus was the part of his life's work that reached the widest audience. The spagyric medicine doctrine became of extraordinary importance for daily practice in 17th-century Europe. The mineral-chemical recipes were presented in a literature that swelled over the years. The most famous of all these treatises was Crollius' Basilica chymica (1608); its balms, elixirs, spirits, and oils gained great renown. Another of the most influential spagyrists was the aforementioned Quercetanus; further notable figures include the French-born Bernardus G. Penotus, active around 1600, and Johannes Beguinus, active in Paris, whose Tyrocinium chymicum (1610) became the most popular of all handbooks in spagyric medicine preparation. Notably, a representative of this Paracelsian pharmacology received Europe's first professorship in chemistry. This was Johannes Hartmann (died 1631), who was appointed in 1609 by Moritz the Learned to hold a professorship in chymiatria in Marburg. Hartmann also worked on general natural philosophy; in a work with the telling title Introductio in vitalem Philosophiam, he followed the Severinian Paracelsism. However, he became particularly influential through his spagyric medicine doctrine, Praxis chymiatrica (1633).
Nevertheless, the new pharmacology also reached far beyond the strictly Paracelsian circles. Many more liberal Galenists sought to benefit from the results of the spagyrists. In doing so, they sometimes emphasized that the chemical method was not discovered by Paracelsus. The prominent chemist Andreas Libavius, a pedagogue in Coburg (died 1616), took this stance; he was ruthlessly critical of Paracelsism in many respects, but as a chemist, he was dependent on its contributions and embraced its medicine doctrine. Daniel Sennert held a similar mediating position. He combined certain Paracelsian teachings with Aristotelian and Galenic doctrines; both Galenic and chemical medicaments, he said (1619), are useful, each in its own way ("utrisque enim suus locus est"). In some places, a practice developed of using traditional Galenic remedies for less severe cases but resorting to the stronger chemical-mineral preparations for more serious illnesses.
Under all circumstances, the spagyrists came into opposition with the inflexible 'dogmatists' who did not wish for any intrusion on Galenism's therapy; they energetically defended the vegetable medicaments prepared through composition. This opposition culminated in the well-known anti-monster debates, leading to open conflict. [p. 27] Antimony was an immensely valued material within Paracelsian circles. However, to the Galenist viewpoint, it appeared as a dangerous poison; in 1566, the medical faculty of the University of Paris, always the guardian of orthodoxy, issued a decree condemning its use in strong terms. In the early years of the 17th century, the conflict over chemical medicaments flared up again, this time in France. The cause was a work published in 1603 by Quercetanus, which sparked a storm of disapproval within the Paris faculty; antimony and other mineral remedies were, they believed, invented by the devil for the ruin of humanity. In a judgement the same year, the faculty condemned the spagyric method as a whole, stating that its use would result in the loss of academic privileges. However, the conflict lasted much longer, and a whole tractate flora grew in its wake, with Quercetanus receiving valuable support from, among others, Libavius. This clash did not signify any victory for the conservative camp.
The essence of Paracelsism cannot be grasped without considering its religious character. Paracelsus' work represented a unique blend of natural science, medicine, and religion, and the same is largely true for the Paracelsian movement as a whole. This explains much of the enthusiasm with which the new doctrines were embraced in certain circles. Paracelsus had shown natural science as a religious task, a contemplation of divine mysteries, which in turn depended on the wisdom the creator bestowed upon certain chosen ones. These motives in Paracelsism irresistibly gripped many minds that were not satisfied by scholastic natural philosophy and orthodox faith. With religious confidence, sometimes heightened to passionate enthusiasm, they delved into the natures of the macrocosm and microcosm. Deus and Natura became equally the focus of the Paracelsian thinker's contemplation; theology and philosophy united in a common realm of truth. Thus, this religio Paracelsica can be characterized, albeit summarily.
Especially characteristic of this worldview are the spiritualistic ideas. This is already noticeable within the theory of knowledge. In these circles, it was believed they worked under special divine assistance, illuminated by divine wisdom. Nature was to be viewed with one's 'inner, heavenly eyes' (Joachim Tanckius 1610). Philosophy was not an independent discipline; it was a "spiraculum Dei." This formed the basis for important parts of the critique of scholastic philosophy. Aristotelian rationalism was seen as disrespecting divine illumination; Aristotle was an impious heathen, and his followers were likewise "ethnici" and "infideles" (Dorn). The full significance of the spiritualistic conviction was already present in Paracelsus' theology. It founded an [p. 28] enthusiastic doctrine of salvation, according to which man, through union with divine power, was transformed into sinlessness and perfection. These ideas were naturally inspired by traditions outside of Paracelsism. Medieval mysticism and the Reformation-era spiritualism of men like Sebastian Franck, Schwenckfeld, and the Anabaptists exerted a decisive influence. This is especially noticeable in the most remarkable representative of Paracelsian religion, the Saxon priest Valentin Weigel (died 1588). This unique man wrote numerous treatises on Christian and philosophical issues, which, however, were not printed until the years 1609–1618. The Christianity he expresses in a uniquely radical form is inspired primarily by Tauler, Franck, and others. Man is presented as essentially good; an 'inner' divine word resides within her, and its breakthrough leads to a miraculous transformation of her nature, a rebirth from which she emerges perfect, saved, and divine. By 'killing the limbs,' man contributes to this; "God alone must work, and man must suffer in the Sabbath." In vigorous polemic against Lutheran orthodoxy, Weigel develops these ideas, as well as other spiritualist principles: the opposition to the written, 'dead' word and the external church of ceremony and sacraments, which is abolished by the true church of the spirit. In this connection to earlier German mysticism, Weigel displays certain non-Paracelsian traits. But Paracelsian religiosity and theology have nonetheless left deep marks in his writings, as he evidently studied Paracelsus' unpublished theological works. Orthodoxy energetically warned against "the new Paracelsian and Weigelian theology." Additionally, Weigel's deep interest in Paracelsian natural and anthropological doctrine is evident. He combines this with his spiritualist Christianity into a unique whole, where philosophy and theology— in true Paracelsian fashion—constantly intertwine.
With the advent of the new century, the spiritualist mindset spreads increasingly in Germany, gaining significance each year due to precarious social and political conditions. Now, the characteristic type of the divinely wise person—theosophist, filled with infallible knowledge of divine and worldly things, and holy in themselves—emerges. This shift towards an exclusive religiosity also applies to Paracelsism. During the 17th century, it increasingly combines with theosophical Christianity, which was opposed by the church. Paracelsism now often acquires a fantastic character. The alchemical and occult elements are reinforced. Significantly, Kabbalistic ideas permeated Paracelsism at this time, particularly its theosophical representatives. Kabbalah, the esoteric secret science of the Jews, reached its final form in the 13th century with the book Zohar. It aimed at a comprehensive explanation of all heavenly and earthly mysteries, but its focus was on exploring the divine; [p. 29] in this pursuit, it methodically used a large extent of numerical and word speculations in the form of interventions in the biblical text according to certain rules; from this perspective, Kabbalah was a "scientia nominum et numerorum." With Pico della Mirandola and Reuchlin, this Hebrew mysticism was introduced into European thought, transformed into a cabala christiana. This especially taught about the nature of the deity and, as practical Kabbalah, about the ways to, in theurgical magic, using the "miraculous word," the name of the Son, dominate nature and perform desired miracles (Reuchlin). Kabbalah was a theosophy; as such, it came to influence the lively mystical speculation at the beginning of the 17th century. The task of Kabbalah, says the Paracelsian Crollius, is to show how God rests in the innermost part of our soul and that this signifies our salvation.
The union of Kabbalistic theosophy and Paracelsism is perhaps nowhere as typical as in the Leipzig physician Heinrich Khunrath (died 1605); his famous Amphitheatrum Sapientiae Aeternae, characterized by an ecstatic mindset, will be studied later in the investigation of Johannes Bureus, who himself is an excellent representative of this direction. The 'enthusiastic' Paracelsism had significant adherents also in researchers like Crollius and Henricus Nollius; in an immensely influential work, Johann Arndt's Vom wahren Christentum (1605 and later), the union of spiritualistic Christianity and Paracelsian natural philosophy, which we here denote as religio Paracelsica, reached a full expression. Jakob Böhme (died 1624) also stood in unbroken communion with these circles; his remarkable theosophical authorship owes much of its uniqueness to Paracelsism.
However, these ideas received their most sensational form in the enigmatic brotherhood of the Rosicrucians. Its primary documents were the two anonymous writings Fama Fraternitatis des Löblichen Ordens des Rosencreutzes (1614) and the following year's Confessio Fraternitatis. To an astonished contemporary audience, the existence of a brotherhood organized for the benefit of humanity was proclaimed; even contemporary readers were mystified, and neither then nor later has anyone succeeded in tracing the authors of the writings or any solid organization of Rosicrucians. The ideas developed in these foundational writings gained remarkable success nonetheless, or perhaps because of this. The brothers aspired, it was said, to a reformation of human knowledge. They wanted to inaugurate a new and golden age before the world ends, a blessed dawn when the treasures of wisdom will be abundantly revealed; wonderful magical arts and a new natural language would play a role in this. They explicitly referred to Paracelsus, and in Paracelsism, the movement indeed has its essential starting point. It is its utopian pathos, its enthusiasm for a revolution in the sciences [p. 30] freed from scholastic doctrine, that above all gave the brotherhood its character. As continuators of Paracelsus' intentions, the Rosicrucians were also generally perceived, both by the hostile guardians of the old order and their own adherents. In a letter to the brotherhood, the letter writer, Adam Haselmeyer, concisely described its doctrine as a "Theophrastia."
The Rosicrucian proclamation spread with a rapidity that already indicates how widespread the longing was to move away from Aristotelian scholasticism. A flood of writings and pamphlets inundated the German book market for a few years. The Rosicrucian question presents a wealth of fascinating, albeit confusing, problems. In any case, it is clear that the movement gradually assumed an increasingly fantastic and spiritualistic nature; alchemists, magicians, and apocalyptic theosophers, sometimes the most brazen charlatans, identified their efforts with those of the Rosicrucians, which particularly alarmed Lutheran orthodoxy. But behind these often unclear and chaotic endeavors generally lay a genuine longing for a new state of affairs.
From the activities of the Rosicrucians, pansophy emerged. Often combined with distinctly theosophical views in individual cases, it represented a comprehensive all-science and an attempt to reshape the sciences from the ground up. The program successfully presented to the public by the first Rosicrucians, the circle around Fama Fraternitatis, was pansophic; thus, this pansophy has its roots in a worldview permeated by a Paracelsian spirit. The pansophic revolution is above all associated with the name of Comenius. His writings on the subject, Pansophia Prodromus (1637) and others, aimed to reform the knowledge system and thus the human condition. The destruction of Aristotelian scholasticism was an imperative demand in this endeavor. New knowledge was to be sought in its place, a general science that is simple and coherent and penetrates to the essences of things. This pansophy, which Comenius tirelessly sought to put into practice, can to some extent be seen as the purest expression of Paracelsism's revolutionary and utopian fundamental view. It, and the activities of the Paracelsists in general during the first half of the 17th century, represent an element of extraordinary importance in a particularly significant time for the sciences. In many ways, this Paracelsism is connected to the experimental natural research now taking shape. In its teachings, Paracelsism was still bound by notions gained without scientific method; its imagination and arbitrariness in combinations often bear the master's signature. But it also had its eyes open to free research; they sought new and previously unheard-of truths and arts. And with this spirit, something of the essential in the remarkable Swiss's great assault on the scholastic learning of his time has been preserved.
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