Roger Bacon: alchemy as positive Science

Abstract

This article presents some of the Roger Bacon’s studies on Alchemy. A medieval philosopher, Bacon continued the tradition of hermetic studies. As part of one of the special sciences, as he understood it, Alchemy was highlighted as an important element in his philosophical-scientific project. In order to present a little about the place of Alchemy in the Baconian corpus, the text starts with a brief exposition of the possible origin of this art among the peoples of Eastern antiquity and, later, its arrival in medieval Europe. It then proceeds to present the alchemical teachings transmitted by Bacon; his understanding of Alchemy not as magic, but as a positive science, whose methods and results could be corroborated by Experimental Science; the elaboration of a brief key to the reading of the alchemical terms sent to Pope Clement IV, together with the defense that Alchemy is a hermetic art and needs to be preserved from the ignorance of the common man, being revealed to those who deserve it in body and soul.