Samuel Norton, the grandson of Thomas, who was also an alchemist, says that Thomas Norton was a member of the privy chamber of Edward IV. Norton’s distinctive views regarding the generation of the metals we have already mentioned (see § 20). He taught that true knowledge of the Art of Alchemy could only be obtained by word of mouth from an adept, and in his _Ordinall_ he gives an account of his own initiation. He tells us that he was instructed by his master (probably Sir George Ripley) and learnt the secrets of the Art in forty days, at the age of twenty-eight. He does not, however, appear to have reaped the fruits of this knowledge. Twice, he tells us, did he prepare the Elixir, and twice was it stolen from him; and he is said to have died in 1477, after ruining himself and his friends by his unsuccessful experiments. CHAPTER IV THE ALCHEMISTS (_continued_) (B. PARACELSUS AND AFTER) Paracelsus (1493-1541.) § =46.= That erratic genius, =Paracelsus=--or, to give him his correct name, Philip (?) Aureole (?) =Theophrast Bombast von Hohenheim=--whose portrait forms the frontispiece to the present work--was born at Einsiedeln in Switzerland in 1493. He studied the alchemistic and medical arts under his father, who was a physician, and continued his studies later at the University of Basle. He also gave some time to the study of magic and the occult sciences under the famous Trithemius of Spanheim. Paracelsus, however, found the merely theoretical “book learning” of the university curriculum unsatisfactory and betook himself to the mines, where he might study the nature of metals at first hand. He then spent several years in travelling, visiting some of the chief countries of Europe. At last he returned to Basle, the chair of Medical Science of his old university being bestowed upon him. The works of Isaac of Holland had inspired him with the desire to improve upon the medical science of his day, and in his lectures (which were, contrary to the usual custom, delivered not in Latin, but in the German language) he denounced in violent terms the teachings of Galen and Avicenna, who were until then the accredited authorities on medical matters. His use of the German tongue, his coarseness in criticism and his intense self-esteem, combined with the fact that he did lay bare many of the medical follies and frauds of his day, brought him into very general dislike with the rest of the physicians, and the municipal authorities siding with the aggrieved apothecaries and physicians, whose methods Paracelsus had exposed, he fled from Basle and resumed his former roving life. He was, so we are told, a man of very intemperate habits, being seldom sober (a statement seriously open to doubt); but on the other hand, he certainly accomplished a very large number of most remarkable cures, and, judging from his writings, he was inspired by lofty and noble ideals and a fervent belief in the Christian religion. He died in 1541.