§ 24. The mystical as distinguished from the pseudo-practical descriptions of the Stone and its preparation are by far the more interesting of the two. Paracelsus, in his work on The Tincture of the Philosophers, tells us that all that is necessary for us to do is to mix and coagulate the “rose-coloured blood from the Lion” and “the gluten from the Eagle,” by which he probably meant that we must combine “philosophical sulphur” with “philosophical mercury.” This opinion, that the Philosopher’s Stone consists of “philosophical sulphur and mercury” combined so as to constitute a perfect unity, was commonly held by the alchemists, and they frequently likened this union to the conjunction of the sexes in marriage. “Eirenæus Philalethes” tells us that for the preparation of the Stone it is necessary to extract the seed of gold, though this cannot be accomplished by subjecting gold to corrosive liquids, but only by a homogeneous water (or liquid)—the Mercury of the Sages. In the Book of the Revelation of Hermes, interpreted by Theophrastus Paracelsus, concerning the Supreme Secret of the World, the Medicine, which is here, as not infrequently, identified with the alchemistic essence of all things or Soul of the World, is described in the following suggestive language: “This is the Spirit of Truth, which the world cannot comprehend without the interposition of the Holy Ghost, or without the instruction of those who know it. The same is of a mysterious nature, wondrous strength, boundless power. . . . By Avicenna this Spirit is named the Soul of the World. For, as the Soul moves all the limbs of the Body, so also does this Spirit move all bodies. And as the Soul is in all the limbs of the Body, so also is this Spirit in all elementary created things. It is sought by many and found by few. It is beheld from afar and found near; for it exists in every thing, in every place, and at all times. It has the powers of all creatures; its action is found in all elements, and the qualities of all things are therein, even in the highest perfection . . . it heals all dead and living bodies without other medicine, . . . converts all metallic bodies into gold, and there is nothing like unto it under Heaven.”[36]
[36] See Benedictus Figulus: A Golden and Blessed Casket of Nature’s Marvels (translated by A. E. Waite, 1893, pp. 36, 37, and 41).
The Theory of Development.
§ 25. From the ascetic standpoint (and unfortunately, most mystics have been somewhat overfond of ascetic ideas), the development of the soul is only fully possible with the mortification of the body; and all true Mysticism teaches that if we would reach the highest goal possible for man—union with the Divine—there must be a giving up of our own individual wills, an abasement of the soul before the Spirit. And so the alchemists taught that for the achievement of the magnum opus on the physical plane, we must strip the metals of their outward properties in order to develop the essence within. As says Helvetius: “. . . the essences of metals are hidden in their outward bodies, as the kernel is hidden in the nut. Every earthly body, whether animal, vegetable, or mineral, is the habitation and terrestrial abode of that celestial spirit, or influence, which is its principle of life or growth. The secret of Alchemy is the destruction of the body, which enables the Artist to get at, and utilise for his own purposes, the living soul.”[37] This killing of the outward nature of material things was to be brought about by the processes of putrefaction and decay; hence the reason why such processes figure so largely in alchemistic recipes for the preparation of the “Divine Magistery.” It must be borne in mind, however, that the alchemists used the terms “putrefaction” and “decay” rather indiscriminately, applying them to chemical processes which are no longer regarded as such. Pictorial symbols of death and decay representative of such processes are to be found in several alchemistic books. There is a curious series of pictures in A Form and Method of Perfecting Base Metals, by Janus Lacinus, the Calabrian (a short tract prefixed to The New Pearl of Great Price by Peter Bonus—see [§ 39]), of which we show three examples in [plates 3] and [4]. In the first picture of the series (not shown here) we enter the palace of the king (gold) and observe him sitting crowned upon his throne, surrounded by his son (mercury) and five servants (silver, copper, tin, iron and lead). In the next picture (plate 3, [fig. B]), the son, incited by the servants, kills his father; and, in the third, he catches the blood of his murdered parent in his robes; whereby we understand that an amalgam of gold and mercury is to be prepared, the gold apparently disappearing or dying, whilst the mercury is coloured thereby. The next picture shows us a grave being dug, i.e., a furnace is to be made ready. In the fifth picture in the series, the son “thought to throw his father into the grave, and to leave him there; but . . . both fell in together”; and in the sixth picture (plate 4, [fig. A]), we see the son being prevented from escaping, both son and father being left in the grave to decay. Here we have instructions in symbolical form to place the amalgam in a sealed vessel in the furnace and to allow it to remain there until some change is observed. So the allegory proceeds. Ultimately the father is restored to life, the symbol of resurrection being (as might be expected) of frequent occurrence in alchemistic literature. By this resurrection we understand that the gold will finally be obtained in a pure form. Indeed, it is now the “great medicine” and, in the last picture of the series (plate 4, [fig. B]), the king’s son and his five servants are all made kings in virtue of its powers.
[37] J. F. Helvetius: The Golden Calf, ch. iv. (see The Hermetic Museum, vol. ii. p. 298).