Johann de Monte-Snyders in Newton’s Alchemy

This chapter focuses on self-proclaimed adept Johann de Monte-Snyders or “Snyders” as Newton usually calls him, who increasingly influenced Newton from the mid-1680s onward. More than any other figure, Snyders fits the picture of a wandering adept who would drift into town, perform a transmutation or two, and then mysteriously disappear. In order to illustrate the way in which Newton tailored the writings of Snyders to fit his own conception of the alchemical magnum opus, the chapter explores other contemporary accounts of Snyders's processes and shows that Newton's interpretation did not fit the standard view. The German adept exercised more impact on Newton the alchemist than any other author short of Philalethes.