Rare first edition of a collection of three earlier published works of the German alchemist and physician Johann Pharamund Rhumel (1597-1661), translated into German and here incorporating information from two others. They all concern spagyric medicine, a term probably first coined by Paracelsus, referring to a particular alchemical process for extracting medicine from plant material. Rhumel was a devoted follower of Paracelsus. Thorndike discusses his theory of the primal being of gold: "Webster credited Rhumelius with an analogous gold-alone theory and said that he distinguished four states of gold, namely, the astral, mineral, metal and elemental. The first was primal being of the Sun (i.e., gold) and was a great secret. Potable gold made from it was superior to that from perfect common gold. Elemental gold was any earth, mineral or stone wherein the spirit of gold lay hid".
Rhumel's earlier publications are extremely rare and the present is the only one commonly referenced.
With an owner's inscription of P. d'Armandy on flyleaf. Some spots throughout, a couple leaves with some minor water damage at the foot, and with a crack down the spine, but otherwise in very good condition. Bruning 1746; Ferguson, Bib. chem. II, p. 267 (incomplete); Krivatsy 10048; VD17 39:140439G; Waller 7931; cf. Wellcome IV, p. 589 (2nd edition); for the author: Hirsch V, p. 122; Thorndike VII, pp. 192-194; for the engraver of the frontispiece: Nagler, Die Monogrammisten II, p. 884.