Paracelsus discovered zinc, a solid metal comparable to the unstable Hg. Mercury, although a metal, is not of the same malleable nature as the first six metals. In a like manner, Indigo, in the prismatic color scheme, is not one of the three primary or three secondary colors, but represents a seventh factor, separate from the others. Indigo, has a bluish mixed tint, just as mercury has a silvery appearance, yet neither one is what its apparent color indicates. If all colors can be produced from white light, then it is possible to reduce them again into white light.
Metals are of similar origin.
All seven primary of one nature, just as the seven prismatic colors are drawn from a single beam of white light. If the origin of the prime metals has not been solved, it is due to the reluctance of science to accept the findings of the alchemists. N ewton tried without success to win acceptance of his theory of light. P aracelsus and others also tried in vain to interest science in their findings, only to be confronted by the unseeing eye and the deaf ear of prejudice. Philosopher's Mercury is the source of all seven primary metals, as, in like manner, white light is the source of the seven prismatic colors.