The _prima materia_ has been defined as a fifth element, or quintessence, the material alpha and omega, the soul of the elements, living mercury, regenerated mercury, a metallic soul, &c. It is designated by such allegorical names as the Bird of Hermes, the Virgin’s Son, the Son of the Sun and Moon, the Virgin’s Head, Azoth, &c. Where it appears to be seriously described the adepts are in continual contradiction, but it is generally allowed to be a substance found everywhere and continually seen and possessed by those who are ignorant of its virtues. “Although some persons,” says Urbiger, “possessed with foolish notions, dream that the first matter is to be found only in some particular places, at such and such times of the year, and by the virtue of a magical magnet, yet we are most certain, according to our divine master, Hermes, that all these suppositions being false, it is to be found everywhere, at all times, and only by our science.”[C] In similar terms, we are told by the “Commentary on the Ancient War of the Knights,” that the matter of the art, so precious by the excellent gifts wherewith Nature has enriched it, is truly mean with regard to the substances from which it derives its original. “Its price is not above the ability of the poor. Tenpence is more than sufficient to purchase the Matter of the Stone.... The matter is mean, considering the foundation of the art, because it costs very little; it is no less mean if one considers exteriorly that which gives it perfection, since in that regard it costs nothing at all, in as much as _all the world has it in its power_, says Cosmopolite, so that it is a constant truth that the stone is a thing mean in one sense but most precious in another, and that there are none but fools that despise it, by a just judgment of God.”