
Originally Posted by
JDP
I have never seen any commentary of this text, even those reputedly written by the author himself, that does not explain that the first key is just about the purification of gold. Taking cues from these commentaries, Lawrence Principe has been able to follow and replicate all the steps in the first few keys, which deal with gold. But as he admits himself, things start getting blurrier and more difficult to interpret in the "middle keys". This is where the issue of the secret solvent comes into play, so no wonder that the text gets obscurer and vaguer.
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