The Hermetic Museum, Vol. I — trans. A. E. Waite (1893)

You might as well try to sever Nature, as endeavour to make metals out of blood. Make a man out of a horse, or a milch cow out of a mouse : this would be according to the same method of multiplication. Art cannot change or overstep the natural order of the universe. Ifa woman bring forth a male child, you cannot change him into alittle girl. From this rule, which evidently obtains throughout Nature, any sane person may gather where, and how, we must look for, and find, our Blessed Matter. But let no one imagine, or suffer any quack to delude him into the belief, that he has all that he requires when the substance has been made known to him either by God, or by one of the initiated. Let him not suppose that the solution and purification are a very simple matter. He could fall into no more serious mistake. He has scarcely got beyond the most elementary stage of his task. Let me once more tell him that I spent five entire years, after discovering the true Matter of the Stone, in the search after the right method of manipulating it, until at length, in the sixth year, the key of power was entrusted to me by the secret revelation of the most High God. "That same key the ancient Patriarchs, Prophets, and Sages have always kept secret. * For i£" says Monarcha, in a certain passage, "they had described it in an universally intelligible manner, and placed it within the reach of every labourer and porter, it would have been a great theft, and no true mystery ; moreover, many evils would arise from such a profanation of the arcanum, which would also

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be manifestly contrary to God's will." For these and other reasons (which I have stated in the Epilogue), lest I should seem to be hiding the talent committed to me by God, I have in this my * Golden Age Come Back " (as far as Nature and God allow) revealed the Great Mystery of the Sages, which, through the grace of God, I have seen with these eyes, and handled with these hands. "The just and pious reader will regard my undertaking with a kindly eye, and not suffer seeming contradictions to mislead him: the theory of and practice of this Art, and the laws which obtain in the Republic of the Chemists, forbade me to write more openly or plainly. Ihope and trust that, nevertheless, all who look upon this book with the eyes of the mind, pore over it by day and by night, and pray to God from the bottom of their hearts, will, together with me, enjoy the wonderful hidden fruits of philosophy. In this way the Brethren of the true Golden Cross, and the elect members of the philosophic communion, are and remain joined together in a great confederation.

In conclusion, that the learned and worthy Christian reader may know my Christian name and my surname, I will remove every cause of complaint by making it known in the following manner. Let all and sundry be certified that the number of my name is I6I3: by this number my whole name is written in the book of Nature with two dead ones, and seven living ones. After that, the letter 5 is the fifth part of B, and 15 the fifth part of 12. With this information you must be satisfied. Written at Taunenberg, March 23rd, 1622.

Epigram to the Sons of Wisdom and the Doctrine.

I have sought ; I have found ; I have often purified ; and I have joined together; I have matured it: Then the golden tincture has followed, which is called the Centre of Nature (heuce so many opinions, so many books, so many parables). It is the Remedy, I openly declare it, for all metals, and for all sick persons. "The solution is of God.

HERMAN DATICHIUS,
The Author's Famulus.

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