The Hermetic Museum, Vol. I — trans. A. E. Waite (1893)
The text is shown on its own: no facing layer is held for this issue.
The translator’s English as printed (A. E. Waite). The original-language text is not held; names are romanised as the translator printed them.
In this way our prepared material is also called male and female, active and passive. So Zimon says, in * The Crowd " : «* Know that the secret of the work consists in male and female,
- &&.,,an active and a passive principle. In lead is found the male, in órpiment the female. The male rejoices when the female is brought to it, and the female receives from the male a tinging seed, and is coloured thereby." And Diomedes says: * Join the í————— É!
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male child of the * red servant? to the fragrant spouse, and they will produce the object of our Art. But you must not introduce any foreign matter, neither dust, nor any other thing. The conception will then be perfect, and a true son will be born. Oh, how precious is the nature of the *red servant, without whom nothing can be effected!" — Others call it quicksilver, or mercury, and sulphur, or fire, as Roger Bacon says, in the third chapter of his * Mirror ": * Out of sulphur and mercury are all metals, and nothing adheres to them, neither is joined to them, or transmutes them, but what is of them. And thus we must accept mercury and sulphur as the matter of the stone." So also Menabadus says: * He who joins quicksilver to the body of magnesia, and the woman to the man, extracts the secret essence by which bodies are coloured." Lullius in his ** Codicil " says: "'The property of our mercury is to be coagulated by its sulphur." And, in the Practice of his Testament : ** The silver is a flowing moisture, floating above and preserving the whole from combustion."
Others use the names, body, spirit, and soul. Thus Arnold, in his * Flower of Flowers," says: * The Sages have affirmed that our Stone is composed of body, soul, and spirit, and they have spoken truly. For the imperfect part they have compared to a body, because it is weak. The water they have called spirit, and truly, because it is spirit. The ferment they have termed soul, because it gives life to the imperfect body (which before was dead), and makes its form more beautiful."
Again, he says : '* A spirit is never joined to a body but by the interposition of a soul. For the soul is the medium between body and spirit, joining them together" ^ Morienus Says: he soul quickly enters its own body— but if you tried to join itto a foreign body, you would labour in vain. And Lilium Says : " Body, soul, and spirit make up one thing, which has all in itself, and to which nothing is added."
But why should we mention and explain all the names by which our Matter is designated? We will be content with the foregoing, seeing that they are the most common and the most germane to our purpose. Inthe following pages, after endeavouring to find where our substance lies hid, and where it may be obtained, we will say some words about the mode of its dissolution, that being afterall the principal objectofour inquiry. And first, as concerns the search after our Matter, we should remember that in the beginning, when there was nothing but Himself, God, who is infinite in wisdom, created two classes of things, namely, those that are in heaven, and those that are under heaven. . The heavenly things (about which we need not here speak at length) are the heavens themselves, and the dwellers in heaven. The things that are under the heavens were created out of four elements, and are commonly divided into three classes. Those that live and feel hold the first place, and are called animals. "The second class are the plants, that grow out of the earth, but do not feel. The third class, that of the minerals, has its origin underground. These three classes include all that (beneath the moon) has been created out ofthe elements. They can never become more or less, and God has bound each thing to its own genus and species, so that it cannot change from one genus to another. If any one tried to make a man or a tree out of a stone, or a monkey or lead out of a plant, or an animal or a plant out of lead, he would be prevented from doing so by the eternal order of the Great King. Ifsucha thing were possible, all classes of natural objects could be changed into one. But, because such a change would put an end to the world, the Ruler of the Universe does not permit it Nay, what is more, He not only restricted everything to its own kind, but gave each created thing its own seed, by which it might be propagated after its own manner—always remaining in its own class, and not overstepping the bounds of some other species. If any one wished to change a man into a horse, an apple into a lettuce, a diamond or any other jewel into gold, he would make an enormous mistake. For such an attempt would be against the nature of sublunar things. And as it was in the beginning so it shall be in the end, when the Almighty, who in the beginning said * Let it be," shall say * Let it perish." But among those things which have a common substance, seed, and elementary composition, it is not difficult to accomplish an amelioration and improvement, by the purification of their matter. So we may see a man of a clear and subtle mind attain to a higher degree of human excellence than others who are less gifted. This difference arises from the superior purity and subtlety of his spiritual substance, which again has its