amuse some of my readers, and will perhaps satisfy others that the mysterious language was somewhat vaguely used by those writers, who all speak of engagements not to communicate except under symbols the information, which each of them refers to oral communication from some elder masters in the art.

"I am Mercury, the mighty flower,

I am most worthy of honour;

I am source of Sol, Luna, and Mars;

I am genderer of Jovis, many be my snares :
I am settler of Saturn, and source of Venus;
I am empresse, princess, and regale of Queenes;
I am mother of myrrour, and maker of lyght;
I am head and highest and fairest in sight;
I am both sun and moone;

I am she that all things must doone.

I have a daughter hight Saturn, that is my darling,
The which is mother of all working;

For in my daughter there been hid
Four things commonly I kydd—
A golden seede and a sperme riche,
And a silver seede none him lych,
And a Mercury seede full brighte,
And a sulphur seede that is righte."

ASHMOLE-T. B. Chemicum, p. 273.

The varied colours of which Faustus makes notice are mentioned in the passages I have quoted. I am inclined, however, to give Ripley's enumeration of them :

"Pale and blacke, with false citryne, unparfyt white and red, Pecock's feathers in colours gay, the rainbow which shall

overgoe,

The spotted panther with the lyon green, the crowys bill bloe as lede,

These shall appear before the parfyt white and many others moe Colours, and after the parfayt white, grey and false citryne

also:

And after all this shall appear the blood red invariable, Thou hast a medicyne of the third order of his own kind multiplicable."

The wheel by which George Ripley illustrates the preparation of the elixir contains part of the language used in this passage of Faust, and is otherwise so curious that I have had it lithographed.

rare occurrence.

The plate from which it has been done is of In Ripley's poem it is repeatedly referred to, and is, I think, one of the most valuable things among the curious matters that Ashmole has brought together. The copies of Ashmole frequently want this plate. I have extended this note too far, yet I must add a sentence or two as to the danger of the medicine. "Unlesse the medicine be qualified as it ought, 'tis death to taste the least atom of it, because its nature is so highly vigorous and strong above that of Man's ; for if its least parts are able to strike so fiercely and throughly into the body of a base and corrupt metal, as to tinge and convert it into so high a degree as perfect gold, how lesse able is the body of Man to resist such a force, when its greatest strength is so far inferior to the weakest metal: I do believe, and am confirmed by several authors, that many philosophers, having a desire to enjoy perfect health, have destroyed themselves by adventuring to take the medicine inwardly, ere they knew the true use thereof, or how to qualify it to be received by the nature of man without destruction.". -Theatrum Chemicum, p. 448.

I fear that I have wearied my readers with this language; however, I wished to show that every expression used by Faustus was taken from the alchymical writers. A single extract more on the subject of the Young Queen in the glass, and I have done. In the notes to Cambridge's Scribleriad, I find the following quotation from a commentator on the work of Ripley which I have before quoted :-" Our books are full of obscurity, and philosophers write horrid metaphors and riddles to those who are not upon a sure bottom, and do not

discern the subject matter of our secrets; which being known, the rest is not so hard." He proceeds to say-- "We join kind with kind, for nature is mended and retained with its own nature for this cause is our king wedded to the water-bearer's daughter; of which water-bearer I told you that his body, his pitcher, and the water in it, are all one; and his daughter was the Queen that arose out of the water in which was seen a lamp burning." The passage continues in the same jargon, and the writer concludes -"Thus have I somewhat metaphorically decyphered our true principles, yet so plainly that you may with diligence understand the meaning."

"The upright art of Alchimie (said Luther) liketh me very well, and indeed it is the philosophie of the ancient. I like it not only for the profit's sake which it bringeth in melting of the metals, in excocting, preparing, and extracting, also in distilling herbs, roots, and in subliming: but also I like it for the sake of the allegorie and secret signification, which is surpassing fair; namely, touching the resurrection of the dead at the last day: for like as in a furnace the fire extracteth and separateth that which is the best out of the matter, yea, it carrieth upwards the spirit, the life, the sap and strength, so that it then trickleth downwards; insomuch that the fat swimmeth above, and the best thereof hovereth always uppermost ; but the unclean matter or the dregs is left at the bottom, like a dead carcass or a worthless thing."-LUTHER'S Table Talk.

Page 70.

Yet such our nature is, &c.

"The soul ascends

Towards her native firmament of heaven,

When the fresh eagle in the month of May,

Upborne at evening on replenished wing
This shaded valley leaves."

WORDSWORTH

Quoted by MR. ZANDER, in his Essay on GOETHE'S Posthumous Works, D. U. Magazine, Vol. II. 370.

In Miss Anna Maria Winter's Thoughts on the Moral Order of NATURE, where she speaks of the effects of climate, are some curious observations, which I shall transcribe.

"The difference between the climate of Ireland and that of Scotland, in reference to their effects on the feelings and imagination, is found to be this:

"The former climate, by the very first impulsion which it gives to your imagination, disposes your soul to wish to spread equally in every direction throughout the horizon.

"That of Scotland, by its first impulsion, gives to your soul a buoyancy which disposes it more to wish to mount than to diffuse itself around. It is not till after it has imagined that it has attained a great height in the air, that it feels the inclination to precipitate itself in any other direction.

"Having thus concluded that the first spontaneous motion of a Scotch imagination and Scotch feelings is to mount upwards, I remarked the Scotch, for the sake of determining whether I was right in this idea, and various peculiarities which I perceived in them convinced me that I was.

"First, extraordinary emotions of mind experienced by a Scotchman are liable to make him imagine that he is forsaking the ground. Often and often have I heard Scotch persons say, in speaking of some book or incident that affected them, 'I thought that the emotion which I felt lifted me off my feet.'*

* A transport of joy makes every one think that he treads in the air, though I believe that it takes this effect more on the Scotch than on the natives of most countries. Besides, persons in general, who thus imagine that a sudden transport of joy enables them to quit the ground, do so merely because they think their gravity lessened or their elastic forces increased. The imagination of the Scotch takes, on these occasions, the same effect on them, but it also makes them mount upwards by dissolving into the elements. It was principally to describe how they had been overcome by emotions of tenderness that they had made use of the expression which I have repeated.

"Secondly, I have observed Scotch peasants, as well as Irish, when their imagination has been raised by a view of mountain scenery, and I have been greatly struck by the contrast which I remarked in the expression of their countenance. The Irishman's eyes show the confusion which his mind is in from its being dragged away in every direction at once by his imagination. The looks of the Scotchman seem all concentred on one fixed point high above him. The more his imagination is exalted, the more this point is elevated; but he always appears to measure with his eye the exact flight which he wishes to take.*

Thirdly, I have frequently remarked natives of Scotland, at times, when a soft music, a languishing dance, or some incident, whose effect on their mind I could not account for, has made an impression, often extremely sudden, on their imagination. At these moments the expression of their eyes became a dying one, and they looked as if their soul were mounting up to the sky, in guise of a soft pure flame."†

* A Scotchman, whose native character is developed by mountain air and a hardy life, commonly looks as if he were in imagination transformed, in some sort, into an eagle soaring high in air, and gazing downward with a keen, attentive, eager eye on the objects of his pursuits on earth.

This expression struck me prodigiously, when I first remarked it; the more so as its duration was frequently momentaneous. I would have been glad to get thoroughly acquainted with the sensation which had produced such a rapid and extraordinary effect. A. M. WINTER-Thoughts on the Moral Order of Nature, (Chambers, Dublin,) 1831, Vol. II. p. 8.