of vegetables, will in time become impregnated with Salt-Petre.
But I must remember that the Water and Earths I ought here to speak
of, are such as are separated from mixt Bodies by the fire; and
therefore to restrain my Discourse to such, I shall tell you, That we
see the Phlegme of Vitriol (for instance) is a very effectual remedie
against burnes; and I know a very Famous and experienc'd _Physitian_,
whose unsuspected secret (himself confess'd to me) it is, for the
discussing of hard and Obstinate Tumours. The Phlegme of Vinager,
though drawn exceeding leasurly in a digesting Furnace, I have
purposely made tryall of; and sometimes found it able to draw, though
slowly, a saccharine sweetness out of Lead; and as I remember by long
Digestion, I dissolv'd Corpals [Errata: Corals] in it. The Phlegme of
the sugar of Saturne is said to have very peculiar properties. Divers
Eminent Chymists teach, that it will dissolve Pearls, which being
precipitated by the spirit of the same concrete are thereby (as they
say) rendred volatile; which has been confirmed to me, upon his own
observation, by a person of great veracity. The Phlegme of Wine, and
indeed divers other Liquors that are indiscriminately condemnd to be
cast away as phlegm, are endow'd with qualities that make them differ
both from meer water, and from each other; and whereas the Chymists
are pleas'd to call the _caput mortuum_ of what they have distill'd
(after they have by affusion of water drawn away its salt) _terra
damnata_, or Earth, it may be doubted whether or no those earths are
all of them perfectly alike: and it is scarce to be doubted, but that
there are some of them which remain yet unreduc'd to an Elementary
nature. The ashes of wood depriv'd of all the salt, and bone-Ashes, or
calcin'd Harts-horn, which Refiners choose to make Tests of, as freest
from Salt, seem unlike: and he that shall compare either of these
insipid ashes to Lime, and much more to the _calx_ of Talk
[Transcriber's Note: Talck] (though by the affusion of water they be
exquisitely dulcify'd) will perhaps see cause to think them things of
a somewhat differing nature. And it is evident in Colcothar that the
exactest calcination, follow'd by an exquisite dulcification, does not
alwaies reduce the remaining body into elementary earth; for after the
salt or Vitriol (if the Calcination have been too faint) is drawn out
of the Colcothar, the residue is not earth, but a mixt body, rich in
Medical vertues (as experience has inform'd me) and which _Angelus
Sala_ affirmes to be partly reducible into malleable Copper; which I
judge very probable: for though when I was making Experiments upon
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