Now then Putrefaction is one of the principall degrees, which indeed might deservedly have been the first of all, but that it would be against the true order, and mystery, which is here hid, and known to few: For those degrees must, as hath been already said, so follow one the other, as links in a chain, or steps in a ladder. [Sidenote: The aforesaid order of Degrees is to be observed in making tinctures.] For if one of the linkes should bee taken away, the chain is discontinued, and broken, and the prisoners would bee at liberty, and runne away. So in a ladder, if one step bee taken away in the middle, and bee put in the upper, or lower part, the ladder would be broken, and many would fall down headlong by it with the hazard of their bodies, and lives. So you must understand the matter here, that those degrees follow one the other in a just order, or else the whole work of our mystery would be mar’d, and our labour, and pains would bee in vain, and fruitlesse. [Sidenote: The force of putrefaction.] Now putrefaction is of such efficacy, that it abolisheth the old Nature, and brings in a new one. All living things are killed in it, all dead things putrefied in it, and all dead things recover life in it. Putrefaction takes from all Corrosive spirits, the sharpnesse of the Salt, and makes them mild, and sweet, changeth the colours, and separates the pure from the impure, it places the pure above, and the impure beneath. [Sidenote: What Distillation is, and its kinds are.] Distillation is the first degree to the Transmutation of all naturall things. Under it are understood Ascension, Lavation, and Fixation. By Distillation all Waters, Liquors, and Oyles are subtilized out of all fat things. Oyle is extracted, out of all Liquors, Water, and out of all Flegmaticke things Water, and Oyle are separated. [Sidenote: Cohobation.] [Sidenote: Fixation by Destillation.] Besides there are many things in Distillation fixed by Cohobation, and especially if the things to bee fixed containe in them Water, as Vitriall doth, which if it bee fixed is called _Colcothar_. Allum, if it bee fixed with its proper Water, is called the Sugar of Allum, which also is resolved into a Liquor, which Liquor if it bee putrefied a moneth, produceth a Water of the sweetnesse of Sugar, which is of great vertue, and an excellent secret in Physicke, to extinguish any Metalline heate in Man, as wee have wrote more at large in our Booke of Metalline Diseases. And as you have heard of Vitriall, and Allum, so also Salt nitre, and other Watery Mineralls may bee fixed by Cohobation. [Sidenote: What Cohobation is.] Now Cohobation is, that the dead head be oftentimes imbibed with its own water, and that again bee drawn off by Distillation. [Sidenote: The force of Distillation in things to be Transmuted.]