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

ZR BEDETSNSR DIOE, dT. EET ES. 269 2the whole horizon) is removed, and Jupiter ascends the throne; then there rises upward a mist of dazzling whiteness, whence there is distilled upon the earth a pure, sweet, and fragrant dew, that softens it and stirs up great winds at its centre ; these winds bear our Stone upward, where it is endowed with heavenly virtue, and thence descending once more to its nurse, the earth, is clothed upon with a corporeal nature, and thus receives the strength both of things above and of things below. This living gold is *that which zs, but does not appear till it pleases the Artist, and in the knewledge of which is the secret of all perfection." Mercury is our field, in which the Sun rises and sets ; let the two be inseparably united on the bed of love, till from this (regenerate) Mercury there comes forth a quickening virtue, which is able to raise the dead. "Then there will appear the royal child, whose father is the Sun, whose mother is the Moon. . . Besides these things, we need, of course, a furnace of clay, a vessel of glass, and a triple fire; but we do not call these three our vessel, oux fire, or our furnace, because ordinary sophists employ these things as well as the Sages ; when we speak of our vessel, our furnace, and our fire, the terms are to be interpreted in accordance with the explanation which we gave above. Of this fire a Sage might well say : * Behold, the fire, which I will shew you, is water"; and again, * The vessel of the Sages is their water." Another Sage says, that all our operations take place in our humid fire, in our secret furnace, and our hidden vessel, and thereby clearly shews that there must be a fire, vessel, and furnace, other than those which ignorant Alchemists possess in greater perfection and abundance than we. Our appliances are part of our substance, and are described by Sendivogius, for instance, as the * vessel of Nature," and the *fire of Nature" This practice is followed by Flamellus, Artephius, Lullius, and all other Sages ; and I tell you that these three appliances are, after all, only one; for the nature of our substance is one. (Our fire is that which dissolves and heats bodies more effectually than ordinary fire ; hence it is called ardent wine and a most strong fire, and the Sages bid us burn our ore with our most strong fire—words which are falsely interpreted of an ordinary coal fire. Of this fire John. Mehungus writes: * No artificial fire can infuse so high a degree of heat as that which comes from heaven,"