From Paris, BnF, Arsenal, MS. 2872. From about f. 401 onward, the manuscript becomes a substantial alchemy compilation.
From f. 401, first page of the 'Testament des nobles philosophes':
"Therefore, first we shall speak of what the noble stone is, and how it is made by nature. God the Glorious made everything by the work of Nature; and all the things that are made by the work of Nature are pleasing to the glorious God of Nature, and all works that are made by the contrary (against Nature) displease Him greatly. Therefore let us work according to Nature, and He who made and ordained Nature will help us—and may it please Him by His grace. This science is the most exalted secret of the noble philosopher Hermes, who was the father of philosophy, and whom we ought to hold in reverence as a wise lord. And it is called the science of philosophy, and it begins as follows.
Here begins the Testament of the Noble Philosophers.
The exposition of the secrets of the wise philosophers concerning the most excellent stone of the philosophers. This stone is a work of Nature and has nothing contrary to it. And it is the medicine of bodies that are infirm, sick, and corrupted. And it transforms and changes bodies from one condition into another—namely, from sickness into health. And for that reason it is called the glorious elemental medicine. For it is composed and ordered and established, from which the four elements are taken; because the philosophers set it forth for the composition of the four […]
The Testament of the Philosophers.
This testament of the wise philosophers comes to us from Hermes, who was the father of the sages/wise men (and of philosophy), and it was afterward expanded/handed down by various philosophers—among them Plato, and others such as […], Theophrastus, Morienus, […]—philosophers who spoke of it. And yet each speaks about the true noble stone of the philosophers, speaking and disputing about it; and each speaks in his books in different ways, by means of figures and metaphorical expressions, so that this glorious science would not be […]"
