Ben Jonson (1573-1637) was one of the foremost of the Jacobean dramatists. He wrote a number of plays (both comedies and tragedies) and a series of stylised masques for the Court. He had a keen eye for the follies of his contemporaries, and in this play he particularly satirises human gullibility. He displays considerable understanding of alchemy and makes many jokes based on its symbolism (and in two places even refers to Dee and Kelly). He obviously expected the audience for this play to have some knowledge of alchemical ideas. Jonson's The Alchemist written in 1610, thus presents us with a satirical window through which we can see one way in which alchemy was perceived in the opening decade of the 17th century.
The characters in the play:-
Subtle - The Alchemist.
Face - The house-keeper, otherwise Lovewit's butler Jeremy.
Dol Common - The conspirator of Subtle and Face.
Lovewit - The owner of the house in which Subtle sets up his work.
Dapper - A Lawyer's Clerk, who wants Subtle to help him in gambling.
Abel Drugger - A Tobacco merchant, who wants Subtle to assist him, through magic in setting up an apothecaries shop.
Sir Epicure Mammon - A Knight, who wants Subtle's help in making him wealthy.
Tribulation Wholesome - A Pastor of Amsterdam.
Ananias - A Deacon, colleague of Tribulation. These religious brothers want Subtle's help in minting money to help establish Puritanism in Britain.
Kastril - The angry boy, recently come into an inheritance. He wants Subtle's help in aiding him to win fights.
Dame Pliant - A widow, sister of Kastril, wants to know her fortune in marriage.
Pertinax Surly - A Gamester, who sees through the deceptions.
Neighbours, Officers, Attendants.
The action takes place in Lovewit's house in London, while he is away in the country.
Quote of the Day
“And therefore our ultimate, or highest secret is, by this our water, to make bodies volatile, spiritual, and a tincture, or tinging water, which may have ingress or entrance into bodies; for it makes bodies to be merely spirit, because it reduces hard and dry bodies, and prepares them for fusion, melting and dissolving; that is, it converts them into a permanent or fixed water. And so it makes of bodies a most precious and desirable oil, which is the true tincture, and the permanent fixed white water, by nature hot and moist, or rather temperate, subtile, fusible as wax, which does penetrate, sink, tinge, and make perfect the work. And this our water immediately dissolves bodies (as sol and luna) and makes them into an incombustible oil, which then may be mixed with other imperfect bodies. It also converts other bodies into the nature of a fusible salt which the philosophers call "sal alebrot philosophorum", better and more noble than any other salt, being in its own nature fixed and not subject to vanish in fire. It is an oil indeed by nature hot, subtile, penetrating, sinking through and entering into other bodies; it is called the perfect or great elixir, and the hidden secret of the wise searchers of nature. He therefore that knows this salt of sol and luna, and its generation and perfection, and afterwards how go commix it, and make it homogene with other perfect bodies, he in truth knows one of the greatest secrets of nature, and the only way that leads to perfection.”
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