CHAPTER I.

Of the True Subject of the Hermetic Art, and its

concealed Boot.

Opus vobiscum et apud vos est, quod intus arripiens et
permanens in terra vel in mare habere potes.

Tractatus Aureus, cap. i.

HITHERTO we have regarded this mystic
labyrinth of Alchemy from without, con-
sidering the superficial scheme only ; before we
enter, it may be well to offer the consenting reader
our clue, lest, observing merely our indirect and
sudden outset, he suppose the way mistaken, and
losing faith accordingly, should decline to pass on
with us further towards the end.

For the paths through which we would conduct
him are dark, intricate, lonely, and in a measure
fearful ; far receding, and out of reach of this outer
daylight, with all its corporeal witnesses and
scenes. Nor has the way become smoother from
being so long a while untrodden. We shall have
to thread many windings, to pass round and
through thick tangles of doubt and overgrown
prejudice, which time has accumulated and thrown
up together at the gates ; before we can hope to
enter the sanctuary of our Minerva, much less
behold the sacred light which burns there before
her pure presence for ever, refulgent and still.

No modern art or chemistry, notwithstanding all
its surreptitious claims, has any thing in common
to do with Alchemy, beyond the borrowed terms,
which were made use of in continuance chiefly to
veil the latter ; not from any real relation, either
of matter, method, or practical result. For though

144 More Esoteric Views.

aqua fortis and aqua regia seem to dissolve metals,
and many salts be found useful in analysis, and fire
for the tearing in pieces of bodies ; yet nothing
vitally alterative is achieved, unless the vital force
be present and in action. But modern art drives
out, in fact, the very nature which the ancients
prized ; distilling and dissecting superficies, harass-
ing for ever, without the more evolving any true
cause : and then some conclude, summarily, there
is no cause, just because their notion of experience
and method of experimenting are superficial and
essentially atheistic.

The pseudo- Alchemists dreamed of gold, and
impossible transformations, and worked with
sulphur, mercury, and salt of the mines, torturing
all species, dead and living, in vain, without rightly
divining the true Identity of nature ; the means
they employed were from literal readings of
receipts ; they had no theory whereby to direct
their research, and making trial of nature, as if
she were a thing of chance, by chance, found
nothing. Some few, of superior imagination to
these, who had glimpses of the Universal Subject,
endeavoured to draw light into the focus of their
vessels, to compress and entice the ether by
magnetical disposition and attractions of various
kinds ; but their hopes too were vaguely based,
there was no Wisdom in their magistery, being
ignorant of that internal fire and vessel of the
adepts, so essential to the accomplishment of the
Hermetic work. For how hardly should they divine
without instruction, or interpret the dark hiero-
glyphic seal ?

It is declared, in the ancient book of Tobit, to be
honourable to reveal the works of the Lord ; but
good to keep close the secret of a king ; and the
old adepts, as if emulous of the sacred ordinance,
whilst they display all the grandeur and abundant
riches of his monarchy, make little or no mention
of the king at all. And whilst the light has remained

The True Subject. 145

so long under the bushel of ignorance, with the
Divine Wisdom under the bark of the Law, it is
deplorable to think how many worthy and truth-
Joving intellects have languished and perished for
/lack of knowledge ; knowledge too that is attain-
able, since it has been attained. For their few
sakes, we now write therefore, and feel emboldened
to hazard evidence of the forbidden truth ; and
without, we trust, transgressing the spirit of the
prophet's advice, it may be allowed to lay open
the regalia so far as shall induce inquiry, and a
more respectful consideration than heretofore.

The inquiries hitherto made by us, concerning
the physical basis of the Hermetic Science, have
helped to identify it with a matter now, at best,
hypothetically conceived of only, since the means
of proving it are unknown, and the obscure in-
structions of the ancients concerning the nature
of their conceptive vehicle, has caused incalculable
error and confusion ; and though the days of gross
credulity have passed away, and a more wide-
spread education has helped to awaken the com-
mon sense of mankind to a perception of the
improbable and ridiculous in most things, yet
other obstacles supervene, as great, if not more
obnoxious to the pursuit of causal science. The
human mind, indeed, has been so long unaccus-
tomed truly to know anything, or even think of,
much less investigate, its own intrinsic al phenomena,
that to speak of them at the present time may
subject us to every imputation of error and
presumption. And why ? A barren period has
supervened ; and man has no longer any experi-
ence in the life of Wisdom, nor yet surmises the
virtue that is in him, to prove and magnify the
Universal Source. Yet that was the foundation
of the whole Hermetic magistery, whence it is
said, that if the wise had not found a proper vessel
in which to concoct it, the etherial corner stone
would never have been brought to light. This

146 More Esoteric View.

Hali declares, and Morien, and Albert, saying,
that the place is the principle also of the super-
natural generation ; and Hermes, vas philoso-
phorum est aqua eorum ; but they do not openly
reveal either, as Maria concludes in her admonition.
— Philosophers have spoken sufficiently of all that
is necessary concerning the work, with exception
of the vessel ; which is a divine secret, hidden from
idolators, and without this knowledge no one can
attain to the magistery.1

Thus it appears to have been a religious principle
with the ancients, to withhold the means of
proving their philosophy from an incapable and
reckless world ; and if any by hazard, less prudent
or envious than the rest, alluded openly in his
writings either to the concealed vessel or art of
vital ministration, his revealment was instantly
annulled by false or weakening commentaries, or
as quickly as possible withdrawn by means not the
less sure, because hidden from the world. Of the
former expedient we have a notable example in
Sendivogius, who, towards the conclusion of his
treatises, referring to the honest Hermit Morien's
advice to King Calid, — Hsec enim res ex te extra-
hitur — This matter, 0 king, is extracted from thee
— endeavours to draw attention off from it, by
inveigling the reader into a doubt artfully raised
about some gold found sticking between a dead
man's teeth.2 Such instances are not rare, and
it has been found easy by such similar equivoca-
tions, without absolute denial, to protect from
foolish and profane intrusion that living temple
wherein alone the wise of all ages have been
securely able to raise their rejected Corner Stone
and Ens of Light.

1 See Maria Practica— in fine — Ludus Puerorum de Vase sive
ovo Philm. in quo lapis noster ponendus est ut igne et arte
perficiatur. — Artis Auriferse, vol. ii. p. 115. Morieni de Trans.
Metal. Interrog. et Resp. p. 27.

2 See New Light of Alchemy, concluding chapter.

The True Subject. 147

When, however, the writings of Jacob Bohme
appeared in Germany, some century and a half
ago, the Alchemists who lived at that period, write
as if they supposed their art could little longer
remain a secret ; a similar alarm had previously
arisen amongst certain Rosicrucians about the
books of Agrippa and Paracelsus' disciples, and in
both instances because those great theosophists
spoke openly, applying the practice of Alchemy
to human life ; suggesting also, as did the
latter, the method and medium of attraction. For,
notwithstanding these, in common with the rest,
teach that the Mercurial Spirit is everywhere, and
to be found in all things according to the nature
of each, yet they do not so much profess to have
sought for it in many things, or that it may with
equal advantage be drawn forth from all ; since
it is neither apt to become universal of its own
accord, or in every Form of virtue sufficient for the
Hermetic work. Therefore, say they, the best
and noblest ought to be chosen to operate with,
unless the searcher proposes to waste labour and
ingenuity without obtaining his desired end.
Besides, to search out the identity through all
creatures and minerals, by way of experiment,
would seem to be a matter of no small difficulty
if we must needs investigate each ; but if one
subject should be presented which contains all,
and the comprehension of each subordinate form in
a superior essence, then this one needs only to be
investigated for the discovery of all. But the
universal orb of the earth, adds the Moorish
philosopher, contains not so great mysteries and
excellences as Man reformed by God into his
image ; and he that desires the primacy amongst
the students of nature, will nowhere find a greater
or better reserve to obtain his desire than in
himself, who is able to draw to himself the Central
Salt of nature in abundance, and in his regenerate
Wisdom possesseth all things, and with this light

148 More Esoteric View.

can unlock the most hidden and recluse mysteries
of nature.3 As Agrippa, moreover, testifies, that
the soul of man, being estranged from the cor-
poreal senses, adheres to a divine nature, from
which it receives those things which it cannot
search into by its own power ; for when the mind
is free, the reins of the body being loosed and going
forth, as out of a close prison, it transcends the
bonds of the members, and, nothing hindering,
being stirred up in its proper essence, comprehends
all things. And therefore man was said to be the
express Image of God, seeing he contains the
Universal Reason within himself, and has a cor-
poreal similitude also with all, operation with all,
and conversation with all. But he symbolises with
matter in a proper subject ; with the elements in a
fourfold body ; with plants in a vegetable virtue ;
with animals in a sensitive faculty ; with the
heavens in an ether ial spirit and influx of the
superior parts upon the inferior ; with the
angelical sphere in understanding and wisdom,
and with God in all. He is preserved with God
and the intelligences by faith and wisdom ; with
celestial things by reason and discourse ; with
all inferior things by sense and dominion ; and
acts with all, and has power on all, even on God
Himself, continues the magician, by knowing and
loving Him. And as God knoweth all things, so
man, knowing Him, also can know all things,
seeing he has for an adequate object Being in
general, or, as some say, Truth itself : neither is
there anything found in man, nor any disposition
in which something of divinity may not shine
forth ; neither is there anything in God which may
not also be represented in man. Whosoever,
therefore, shall know himself, shall know all things
in himself ; but especially he shall know God,
according to whose image he was made ; he shall
know the world, the resemblance of which he
3 Centrum Naturae Concentratum, page 40, &c.

The True Subject. 149

beareth ; he shall know all creatures with which in
essence he symboliseth, and what comfort he
can have and obtain from stones, plants, animals,
elements ; from spirits, angels, and everything ;
and how all things may be fitted for all things, in
their time, place, order, measure, proportion, and
harmony ; even how he can draw and bring them
to himself as a loadstone, iron.4

And this the adept, Sendivogius, moreover de-
clares : That nature, having her proper light, is
by the shadowy body of sense, hidden from our
eyes ; but if, says he, the light of nature doth
enlighten any one, presently the cloud is taken
away from before his eyes, and without any let,
he can behold the point of our loadstone, answering
to each centre of the beams, (viz. of the sun and
moon philosophical,) for so far doth the light of
nature penetrate and discover inward things ; the
body of man is a shadow of the seed of nature, and
as man's body is covered with a garment, so is
man's nature covered with the body. Man was
created of the earth, and lives by virtue of the air ;
for there is in the air a secret food of life, whose
^invisible congealed spirit is better than the whole
world. Oh, holv and wonderful nature ! which
knowest how to produce wonderful fruits by water,
out of the earth and from the air to give them life !
The eyes of the wise look upon nature otherwise
than the eyes of common men. The most high
Creator, having been willing to manifest all natural
things to man, hath even showed us that celestial
things themselves were naturally made ; by which
his absolute power and wisdom might be so much
the better known ; all which things the philo-
sophers in the light of nature, as in a looking-glass,
have a clear sight of ; for which cause they es-
teemed this art of Alchemy, viz., not so much out
of covetousness for gold or silver, but for the
knowledge sake ; not only of all natural things,
4 Occult Philosophy, book iii. chap, xxxvi. and xlvi.

150 More Esoteric View.

but also of the power of the Creator. But they are

willing to speak of these things sparingly only, and

figuratively, lest those divine mysteries, by which

, nature is illustrated, should be discovered to the

unworthy ; which thou, if thou knowest how to know

thyself, and art not of a stiff neck, mayest easily

comprehend, who art created after the likeness of

[the great world, yea after the image of God. Thou

hast in thy body the anatomy~of the whole world,

and aTTEKy members answer to some celestials; let,

therefore, the searcher of this Sacred Science know

'that the soul in man, the lesser world or microcosm,

substituting the place of its centre, is the king, and

is placed in the vital spirit in the purest blood. That

j governs the mind, and the mind the body ; but

Ithis same soul, by which man differs from other

animals and which operates in the body, governing

all its motions, hath a far greater operation out

of the body, because out of the body it absolutely

reigns ; and in this respect, it differs from the life

of other creatures which have only spirit and not

the soul of Deity.5

Such are the distinctive assertions of one es-
teemed an adept by his cotemporaries, and who
professes to ground them also on his own manual
experience in the proto-chemistry of Hermes. And,
whether they be entirely credited or not, these may
help to elucidate the words of Trismegistus, where,
in the first chapter of the Golden Treatise, he sa}^s,
j — that the work is both in us and about us ; and
that the whole magistery is comprehended in the
hidden elements of his Wisdom.6 And Geber, in
the same sense, where he declares that he who in
] himself knows not natural principles, is very
iremote from this sacred science, because he has
'not the true root in him whereon to base his labour
and intention.7 Observe, therefore, and take heed,

5 New Light of Alchemy, pp. 32, 40, 102.

6 Tract. Aur. cap. i. & ii.

7 Sum of Perf. book i.

The True Subject. 151

says Basil, that all metals and minerals have one
root from whence their descent is ; he that knows
that rightly needs not to destroy metals in order to
extract the spirit from one, the sulphur from
another, or salt from another ; for there is a nearer
place yet in which these three, viz., the mercury,
salt, and sulphur — spirit, body and soul — lie hid
together in one thing, well known, and whence
they may with great praise be gotten. He that
knows exactly this golden seed or magnet, and
searcheth throughly into its properties, he hath
the true root of life, and may attain to that which
his heart longs for ; wherefore I intreat, continues
the monk, all true lovers of mineral science, and
sons of art, diligently to inquire after this metallic
seed, or root, and be assured that it is not an idle
chimera or dream, but a real and certain truth.8
It was from such an internal intimacy, and
central searching of the mystery, that the Paracel-
sian Crollius tells us he came to know that the
same light and mineral vapour, which produces
gold within the bowels of earth is also in man, and
that the same is the generating spirit of all crea-_
i tures.9 And Albertus Magnus, in his book of
Minerals, after asserting that gold may be found
everywhere, in the final analysis of every natural
thing,"" concTucIes by showing that the highest
mineral virtue nevertheless resides in man ; for
fire, which is the true aurifiG principle in the life of
all, burns more than all glorious in him erect. —
Our Mercury is philosophic, fiery, vital — which
may be mixed with all metals and again be separ-
ated from them ; it is prepared in the innermost
chamber of life, and there it is coagulated, as the
Hermetic phrase runs, and where metals grow
there they may be found.10

8 See the Stone of Fire, Kirchringius. Ed. Webster's Hist,
of Minerals, p. 9, the Extract.

9 Crollius' Philosophy Reformed, p. 105.
10 Tract. Aureus. Text et Scholium, cap. i.

152 More Esoteric View.

Remember how man, ys most noble creature
In Erth/s composycion that ever God wrought,
In whom are the fowre elements proportyonyd by nature,
A naturall mercuryalyte whych cost ^ght nought,
(Jut of hys myner by arte yt most be brought ;
For our mettalls be nought ells but myners too,
Of our Soon and Moone, wyse Reymond seyd so.11

And though the philosophers have chosen to say
little about it, on account of the shortness of life,
and the length of this work, as Maria says, yet
they themselves found out these hidden elements,
and themselves increased them. And thou, oh,
Man, cries the Arabian Alipili, even thou art he
who through the breath and power of the water
and earth in thyself, conjoinest the elements and
makest them one ; and thyself not knowing
what a treasure thou hast hidden in thee, from the
coagulation and consent of these powers, pro-
ducest an essence, called, by us, the expert, the
great and miraculous mystery of the world ; that
is the true fiery water. — Eschva mayim, Erascha
mayim, yea, it surmounts in its power, the fire, air,
earth and water ; for it dissolves radically,
incrudates even the mature, constant, and very
fixed, fiery and abiding mass and matter of gold,
and reduces it into a fit black earth, like to thick
spittle ; wherein we find a water and the true
salt destitute of all odor, vehemency, and corro-
sive nature of the fire : there is nothing in the
whole world besides to be found which can do this ;
to which nothing is shut ; and though it is a
precious thing, more precious than everything,
yet the poor as well as the rich may have it in
the same equal plenty. The wise men have sought
this thing, and the wise men have found it.12

And it behoves him, therefore, who would be
introduced to this hidden Wisdom, says Hermes,
to quit himself from the usurpations of vice, to be
good and just and of a profound reason, ready at

11 Ripley's Admonition of Erroneous Experiments

12 Centrum Naturae Concentratum, pp. 80, 81.

The True Subject. 153

hand to help mankind ; for these subtle chemical
secrets may never be handled by the idle or vicious
unbelievers of these matters in which they are only
ignorant, who, being destitute of light, defile by
an evil imagination the very Spirit that ought to
be refined. — Omne Aurum est a?s, sed non omne aes
est aurum : — and the true physician, according to
Crollius (whom Paracelsus calls a natural divine)
is true, sincere, intelligent, faithful ; and being
well exercised in the vital analysis of bodies,
knows that there is no constant quality of any
body which is not to be found in the salt, mercury,
and sulphur thereof.13 And these three principles
of attraction, repulsion, and circulation, the uni-
versal accord of life, are everywhere and in all.

Blood containeth the three things I have told,

And in his tincture hath nature of gold :

Without gold, no metal may shine bright ;

Without blood no body hath light :

So doth the greater and less world still

Hold the circle according to God's will.

Blood hath true proportion of th' elements foure,

And of the three parts spoke of before ;

For blood is the principle matter of each thing,

Which hath any manner of increasing.

The true blood to find without labour or cost,

Thou knowest where to have it, or thy wits be lost ;

Seek out the noblest, as I said before,

And now of the Matter, I dare say no more.14

Or, what more shall I say ? (asks Morien, em-
phatically, discoursing with the Arabian monarch
about the confection of the Stone, and after show-
ing the distinctive supremacy of man in nature.)
The thing, O king, is extracted from thee, in the
which mineral thou dost even exist ; with thee it
is found ; by thee it is received ; and when thou
shalt have proved all by the love and delight in
thee, it will increase ; and thou wilt know that I
have spoken an enduring truth.15

13 Phil. Reform, pp. 25, 95. Tract. Aureus, cap. ii.

14 Theat. Chem. Britt. p. 405.

15 De Transm. Metal. Artis Auriferse, vol. i. end.

154 More Esoteric View.

Although few write so clearly to the purpose
as those we have sleeted, yet the more modern class
of adepts have in general left hints and suggestions
to the same effect ; they describe the life of man,
as by their Art revealed, to be a pure, naked, and
unmingled fire of infinite capability, differing
from that of the prone creatures in form, educa-
bility, and capacity for melioration in itself. And
though it might be supposed, according to the
alleged diffusion of the Matter, that, if the Art of
separating it were known, it might be taken any-
where (which in part also is true) yet we may con-
sider the object was not simply to obtain the
Matter or prove it only, but to improve, perfect,
and bring the Causal light to manifestation. And
in what our human circulatory system differs and
occultly approximates, so that it can be made to
comprehend all inferior existences, and supersede
nature in her course, may be gathered from this
philosophy ; and many reasons are given why
the most noble subject was chosen, and this only
vessel for its elaboration. The foregoing evidence,
however, without more defence at present, may
help to lead on the inquiry to* a more explicit
ground.

Attraction is the first principle of motion in
nature ; this is generally admitted, but the origin
of this universal attraction is occult and incom-
prehensible to the ordinary human understanding.
Repulsion is the second principle, and a necessary
consequence of the first by reaction. Circulation
is the third principle, proceeding from the conflict
of the former two.

All motion is derived from this threefold source
in its reciprocal relations, which are diversified
according to its qualifications with the matter.
The attraction, repulsion, and circulation in the
sun and stars move the planets in their orbits ;
the same principle in each globe performs the
rotation on its axis, and the satellites partake the

The Xrue Subject. 155

same motion from their primaries. Every quantity
of matter, solid, fluid, or gaseous, when separated
from the rest by its quality or discontinuity, is
possessed individually by the same principles,
however infinite the variety of substances, natural
or artificial, great or small ; vegetable and animal
forms and motions are no less evidences of these
three principles than the heavenly and earthly
bodies. Hence chemical affinity, called Elective
Attraction, is ruled by the same laws ; and it is
found that when two matters unite, one is attract-
ive and the other repulsive ; when either attrac-
tion or repulsion predominates in a matter, the
circulation is in ellipse ; but when they are in
equilibrium, a circle is produced. Repulsion, being
produced in its origin by attraction, equals it, as
reaction equals action : but in nature one principle
is everywhere more latent or inert, or weaker than
another ; and there are degrees accordingly, in
which either predominates in external manifesta-
tion ; hence the different degrees of natural
affinity for union. There are also degrees of
strength, from harshness to mildness, and in the
operation of the Three Principles, from the
compactness of a hard rock to the loose adherence
of the particles of a globule of mercury or dew,
from explosion to expansion, and from a violent
whirling motion to a gentle evolution. But the
medium is always in the circulation produced from
the action and reaction of centrifugal and cen-
tripetal forces, and the equality of these forms a
circle, as was before observed, and which labours
to harmonize the conflict of these two, and will
succeed if the matter be duly qualified for it.

But, according to the Alchemists, there is but
One Matter truly qualifiable or capable of qualify-
ing matter to be harmonized in this way, since
nature has fallen off from her original balance, and
the wheel of human life runs forth, deviating from
its axis, into a line which terminates finally in

156 More Esoteric View.

dissolution ; which nothing but their Antimonial
Spirit rectified by Art, being in bright lines of equal
attraction and repulsion, as it were a perfect
magnet in a star-like circle of irradiated circulation,
can contrariate or withstand.16

And the agent in the preparation of this spirit,
continues Bohme, is the Invisible Mercury, and
no process can finally fail where the invisible,
Universal Mercury, or spiritual air of Antimony, is
present, condensed in its proper vehicle in any
of the degrees of permanency ; and the Principle
of its operation consists in the power of harmonising
the three discordant principles of Attraction, Repul-
sion, and Circulation ;17 and this is the vital spirit
of the arterial blood, where the universal princi-
ples are in their natural generation unequally
composed : the repulsive force so far predomina-
ting over the interior attraction, that the total
circulatory life is expulsive, and drawn without
to a debilitated consciousness away from its First
Cause. Which inverse order of relationship and
vital ignorance it is the object of the Hermetic
art to remedy, and, by occupation of the opposive
principle, to restore the true rector to his original
rule. Sanguinem urinamque pariter dat nobis
natura, et ab horum natura salem dat Pyrotechnia,
quern circulat ars in salem circulatum Paracelsi.
Hoc addam : sanguinis salem per urinaceum
fermentum sic transmutari debere, ut ultimam
vitam amittat, mediamque servet, salsedinemque
retineat.18

Si fixum solvas faciasque volare solutum
Et volucrem figas, faciunt te vivere tutum
Solve, Coagula, Fige.

This know, therefore, says Hermes, that except
thou understandest how to mortify and induce

16 See Jacob Bohme on the Generation of the Three Prin-
ciples.

17 Idem, see Phillips's Lives of the Alchemists, p. 294, &c.

18 Arcanum Liquaris Alkahest Resp. 876, 78.

The True Subject. 157

generation, to vivify the spirit, to cleanse and in-
troduce Light, until they fight and contend with
each other, and grow white and freed from their
defilements, rising, as it were, from blackness
and darkness, thou knowest nothing, nor canst
perform anything ; but if thou knowest this, thou
shalt be of a great dignity.19 All which our modern
exponent, further illustrating the Hermetic process,
confirms. For, in three months' circulation, says
he, by digestion, the powder becomes completely
black, the opposition of attraction and repulsion
ceases (in the vital spirit), and the attraction of
the fixed which produced the repulsion of the
volatile, is slain by the circulation which also
dies itself, and all three enter into rest. Then
there is no more compression or expansion, ascent
or descent, but the action and reaction have, by
the equilibriate radiation of forces and the subtlety
of the spirit, formed a circulation which has con-
sumed all discordant opposition, and sunk down
black and motionless. And thus the head of
Hermes' crow is said to be in the beginning of
this work ; that which at first was fixed, viz., the
sentient medium, is dissolved, and by the same
process more profoundly operating, the original
evil is made manifest in the matter to be renewed,
and hence the principle of amendment and recti-
fication also will appear, and on either side it is a
signal of Art.

The same Three Principles gradually assume a
new life, continues Bohme, infinitely more powerful
in virtue, but without any violent contest, and in
three months farther, the mild action of the princi-
ples in harmony have produced a brilliant white-
ness in the matter, which in three months more
become a brilliant yellow, red, or purpling
tincture. — Approach, ye sons of Wisdom, and
rejoice ; let us now rejoice together, for the reign
of sin is finished, and the king doth rule, and now
19 Tract. Aur. cap. ii.

158 More Esoteric View.

he is invested with the red garment, and now the
scarlet colour is put on.20

That was the process of working with the Vital
Spirit, so often reiterated by Hermes, Democritus,
and the rest before cited, which also is many times
passed through for the practical accomplishment.
But every other matter labours for this perfection
in vain ; it can only attain to combustion, heat,
and temporary light, and the consumption of the
common elements in their analysis is a separation
into gas and ashes ; but this mystical nature
revives, fortified from every successive dissolution,
renewing its Whole resolutely from either extreme
by union. This Spirit is so full of life, says the
adept, that if the process fails in any stage, an
addition of the same will renew it. The white or
red powder is increased tenfold in strength and
quantity by each digestion of it with fresh
antimony in "powder, wet with gas water, or oil of
this antimony, and each digestion is made in
tenfold shorter time than the preceding from a
week to a few hours. For this gold is endued with a
magnetical virtue, which by the inspissate fulgor
of its tincture, draws the divine increase after it ;
in which nature expends all her forces, but leaves
the victory to Art, which by graduation to the full
height, adds to the natural effulgence a super-
natural light ; for what else but light should
multiply ? Whence it has been called likewise the
terrestrial or Microcosmic Sun, the triumphal
Chariot of Antimony turned swiftly upon the
current wheel of life ; and this is the Stone of Fire
seen in bright lines, of equal attraction and repul-
sion, when made manifest, as it were, an armed
magnet included and circulating in a perpetual
heaven.21 Know now, therefore, and consider, says

20 Tract. Aur. cap. iii.

21 Aurum ex se virtutem magneticam habet, qua) cor
humanum f ulgore splendente tincturse suae trahit, in qua natura
omnes vires suas impendit, reservata tamen artis industriae

The True Subject. 159

Basil Valentine, that this true tincture of Anti-
nony, which is the medicine of men and metals,
s not made of crude melted antimony, such as the
ipothecaries and merchants sell, but is extracted
Tom the true mineral, as it is taken from the
nountains ; and how that extraction should be
nade, is a principal secret in which the whole art
)f Alchemy consists. Health, riches, and honour
ittend him who rightly attains it. — Lapis noster
nter duos monticulos nascitur ; in te et in me et
n nostri similibus latet.22 And when the mechani-
3al part of the Three Principles passes into the
tiands of its proper manufacturers equally and
generally in all countries, concludes Bohme, then
will the school of adepts come out from its cap-
tivity, and will find their proper level as true
physicians for the body and soul, dispensing the
leaves of life for the healing of the nations.
But now the Seal of God lieth before it, to conceal
the true ground, unless a man knew for certain
that it would not be misused ; for there is no power
to obtain it, no art or skill availeth, unless ont
intrust another with somewhat (as Hermes and
Arnold bear witness) ; yet the Work is easy and
simple, but the wisdom therein is great and the
greatest mystery.23

victoria, ut per graduationem supremam, quam splendor1
naturali adjungit, infinite earn superare possit, unde et nomen
solis terrestris acquisivit. Artista igitur labore suo colorem
aureum (in cujus pretioso opere perflciendo natura vires suas
omnes impendit) usque ad summum gradum ruboris, obscuri
exaltat, qua augmentatione metalla imperfecta in certa
quantitate, ratione gradus naturalis per projectionem tincturae
hujus artificialis altius ascendunt et colorantur, eo ipso
monstrans , quod color iste aureus per naturam in aurum
introductus tantum via aliqua sit ad rubidinem in qua com-
plectio perfects virtutis ad conservandum et multiplicandum
jjacet. — Tractatus de Vero Sale, Nuysement, p. 164.

22 Triumphal Chariot of Antimony, by Kirchringius, English
edition, p. 146. M. Dunstani Tract. Secret, in init.

23 See Bohme's Epistles, and early part of the Forty Ques-
tions, and his Discourse of the Three Principles before referred
to, containing passages to the same effect.

160 More Esoteric View.

The greatest mystery of all is in Existence, and
the only myster}^ ; and as fire and light are one
and everywhere perceived after the same manner,
so is life in every particular the same inscrutable
Identity through all. Or does a vast and filled
creation hang before our eyes, and we think it to
be without a foundation ? Do we ourselves exist
and consciously breathe, denying a mystery ; or
rather, admitting this, does anyone doubt that
it is discoverable ? Does not everything imply a
necessary cause, and is not each sustained still
living in the same ? and is it not absurd to suppose
that we are entirely depending on externals, or
that being in part self-dependent, we are so far
depending on nothing ? If, therefore, we contain
within us a proper principle of being, why should
not this, thus proximate, be known ? Behold, says
the apostle, He is not far off from every one of us ;
for in Him we live, and move, and have our being.
— And again, to those forgetful Athenians, — God
made man to the end that he should seek the Lord,
if haply he might feel after him and find him.24
And is not this a promise worth the certifying,
an end worthy to be sought out, to feel and know
God ? Seek and ye shall find, knock and it shall
be opened unto you ; yet it remains hidden still :
and that Philalethean Welshman, Vaughan, indeed
advises that we give ourselves no trouble about
these mysteries, or attempt to dabble in the
subtle philosophy of Wisdom, until we have a
knowledge of the Protochemic Artifice ; for that
by means of this, and this only, the true foundation
is discoverable, and without it nothing can be
intrinsically understood. It were a foolish pre-
sumption, he observes, if a lapidary should under-
take to state the value or lustre of a jewel that
is shut up, before he opens the cabinet ; yet men
will presume to judge of invisible celestial things,
which are shut up within the closet of matter, and

24 Acts xvii. 27, 28.

The True Subject. 161

all the while perusing the outside which is the crust
of nature. But I advise them to use their hands
and not their fancies, and to change their abstrac-
tions into extractions ; for verily as long as they
lick the shell after their fashion, and pierce not
experimentally into the centre of things, they can
do no otherwise than they have done ; they cannot
know things intrinsically, but only describe them
by their outward effects and motions, which are
subject and obvious to every common eye. Let
them consider, therefore, that there is in nature a
certain Spirit which applies himself to the matter,
and actuates in every generation ; that there is
also a passive intrinsical principle where he is more
immediately resident than in the rest, and by
mediation of which he communicates with the
more gross material parts. For there is in nature
a certain chain or subordinate propinquity of
complexions between visibles and iirvisibles, and
this is it by which the superior spiritual essences
descend and converse here below with the matter.
But, he continues, have a care lest you misconceive
me. I speak not in this place of the divine spirit,
but / speak of a certain Art by which a Particular
Spirit may be united to the Universal ; and nature
by consequence be strangely exalted and multiplied. ,25
And Agrippa speaks yet more specifically to this
point, where, in the third book of his Occult
Philosophy, he declares (calling Apuleius also to
witness) that by a certain mysterious recreation
and appeasing, the human mind, especially that
which is simple and pure, may be converted and
laid asleep from its present life so utterly as to be
brought into its divine nature, and become
enlightened with the divine light, and withal receive
the virtue of some wonderful effects.26

Both these passages are in allusion to the art of
Alchemy ; and this, persists Agrippa, is that which

25 Anima Magia Abscondita, pp. 10, 11.

26 Book iii. cap. xlviii.

162 More Esoteric View.

I would have you know ; because in us is tho
Operator of all wonderful effects ; who know how
to discern and to effect, and that without any sin
or offence to God, whatsoever the monstrous
mathematicians, the prodigious magicians, the
envious alchemists, and bewitching necromancers
can do by spirits, in us, I say, is the Operator of
miracles.

Not the bright stars of the skie, nor flames of hell.
But the Spirit begetting all doth in us dwell.27

How many earnest and curious books there have
been written relative to the powers of magic and
transformations by spells, talismans, and circum-
stantial conjurations of all sorts, which, taken
according to the letter, are ridiculous without the
key. But the records of Alchemy are, above all,
calculated to mislead those who have gone abroad
thoughtlessly seeking for that perfection which
was to be found only by experimentally seeking
at home within themselves.

Quid mirum noscere mundum
Si possunt homines, quibus est et mundus in ipsis
Exemplumque Dei quisque est in imagine parva ?28

Man then, shall we conclude at length, is the true
laboratory of the Hermetic art ; his life the
subject, the grand distillatory, the thing distilling
and the thing distilled, and Self-Knowledge
to be at the root of all Alchemical tradition ? Or,
is any one disappointed at such a conclusion,
imagining difficulties, or that the science is im-
practicable because it is humanly based ? — or some
may possibly think the pursuit dangerous, or
inexpedient, or unprofitable, scientific investiga-
tion having been so long and successfully carried
on in every adverse direction ? Behold we invite
not the unwilling, nor will these studies be found
to reward the sordid seeker after riches or gold
only ; such may find better employ and easier

27 Epistle to Trithemius at the end.

28 Manilius Astronomicon, lib. x.

The True Subject. 163

emolument from the abundant offering of the
precious metal upon earth, nor do we anticipate
that many will in the present day be attracted
to our goal.

Yet, notwithstanding so much scepticism and
the slur which ignorance has cast now for centuries
upon every early creed and philosophy, modern
discoveries tend evermore to reprove the same ;
identifying light, as the common vital sustenant,
to be in motive accord throughout the human
circulatory system with the planetary spheres
and harmonious dispositions of the occult medium
in space ; and as human physiology advances
with the other sciences in unison, the notion of
our natural correspondency enlarges, proving
things more and more minutely congruous, until
at length, the conscious relationship would seem
to be almost only wanting to confirm the ancient
tradition and lead into its full faith. Yet on no
ground with which we are now actually acquainted
could it be proved that man is a perfect microcosm,
wherein, as it was said, the great world and all its
creatures might be summarily discerned : we have
no evidence of any such thing ; our affinities with
external nature are bounded in sense, and our
knowledge of her integral operations is propor-
tionately defective. All that we do know is
learned by observation, and we should be hardly
induced, from an}^thing we are commonly con-
versant with, to conclude that Self-Knowledge
would be a way to the knowledge of the Universal
Nature. Yet this was taught and believed form-
erly, not either as if it were an arbitrary conceit,
but as a truth understood and proved beyond
speculation.

It may be well to observe, however, and lest
misunderstanding should at all arise in this respect,
that it is not so much with reference to physical
particulars, either to the perfection of his bodily
constitution, or because he is composed of the four

164 More Esoteric View.

elements, that man was formerly distinguished ;
for these other animals and vegetables even par-
take, and often in a superior degree : but it was
rather on account of a Divine Reason, on occult
principle of Causal Efficience, said to be originally
resident in his life, that man was made to rank so
high in the cabalistic scriptures and schools of an-
tique experience. And here we remark the outer
body, mentioned indeed, yet as amongst the last
of things accordant ; nevertheless it is nearly all
we are now able to observe ; as, of the rest, the
Universal Reason so magnified and its ethereal
vehicle, very meagre evidence is afforded to the
senses or this life. Yet man, say they, is demon-
strated to be a compendium of the whole created
nature, and was generated to become wise and
have a dominion over the whole of things ; having
within him, besides those faculties which he exerts
ordinarily and by which he judges and contem-
plates sensible phenomena, the germ of a higher
faculty or Wisdom, which, when revealed and set
alone, all the forms of things and hidden springs
of nature become intuitively known and are implied
essentially. This Being, moreover, or Faculty of
Wisdom, is reputed so to subsist with reference to
nature as her substratal source, that it works
magically withal, discovering latent properties as a
principle, governing and supplying all dependent
existence ; and of this they speak magisterially,
as if in alliance they had known the Omniscient
Nature and, in their own illumined understanding,
the structure of the universe.

Now if it be true that such an experience was
ever granted to man on earth, it is now either
wholly departed or the conditions are estranged.
We can but with difficulty imagine, much less are
we able to believe, ourselves capable of enjoying
that free perspicacity of thought in universal con-
sciousness which is cognizant by rapport with
essential being. Man from his birth employs sense

The True Subject. 165

prior to reflection, and all our knowledge begins
in this life with sensible observation ; most persons
pass on well contented with such evidence as
externals supply, regarding them as the only
legitimate, or, indeed, possible objects of know-
ledge. But some few there have been in all ages,
exceptions to the multitude, intellects in whom the
standard of reality has been too far unfolded to
suffer them to yield implicitly to the conclusions
of sense. It is not those who have studied the
philosophy of the ancients that have denounced
it as chimerical ; our metaplrysicians, without
exception amongst those deserving the appellation,
and who aspired after the same convictive truth,
have lamented the inadequacy of natural reason,
at the same time that they recognised the suprem-
acy of its Law as measuring and determining
sensible particulars ; but they have not been able
to redeem it from dependency on these ; for every
attempt of the unassisted reason terminates
negatively, as the Subject Identity slides evermore
behind the regardant mind ; it is only able at
best, therefore, to maintain a counter ground,
whereby to prove the shifting evidence of its own
and other earthly phenomena.

But although satisfaction is thus denied to
modern inquiry, and philosophers have disputed
about the conditions and difficulty of the Absolute
ground, yet are there none found, even in latter
times, so presumptuous as to deny the possibility,
seeing it thus doubly implied, no less in the testi-
mony of the highest reason than of tradition : and
so they have honoured the ancients afar off either
in despair or admiration of their Wisdom, unable
themselves to break the enchantment which
isolates the reflective faculty, and disables it in the
inquiry after that Fontal Nature which, by a
necessary criterion, it craves.

For we may observe, that the evidence of reason,
even in common life, is irresistible, or, more exactly

166 More Esoteric View.

to speak, intuition is the evidence and end of eve^
rational proof. We believe in the phenomenon of
existence spontaneously, but in a power of ante-
cedents to produce their effects necessarily ; in the
idea of time, eternity is implied ; with bound,
infinity ; as the unit is included in each dependent
of a numerical series, and the mathematics have
their evidence in intellectual assent ; nor do we
ever question the validity of the Law, which thus
abstractedly concludes within us, though our
inferences from external facts are for ever varying,
and perpetually at fault.

Locke, discoursing upon the intrinsic superiority
of the Intellectual Law in his Essay, observes that
Intuitive faith is certain beyond all doubt, and
needs no proof beyond itself, nor can have any,
this being the highest of all human certainty. And
it is this very truth, that a no less eminent French
philosopher, Victor Cousin, has successfully em-
ployed within these few years, to shake the sensual
system of Locke and Condillac to its foundation.29
And this subsistence of Universals in the human
mind deserves to be profoundly considered by all
who are interested in the pursuit of truth ; for it
includes a promise far beyond itself and stable
proof of another subsistence however consciously
unknown. Thus, if ordinary conviction is not
attained but by an assurance of reason to itself,
and if, in the discovery of and assent to universal
propositions, there is no use of the discursive
faculty or of external facts to witness ; if, in
short, we really know anything of self-evident
intellectual necessity, independent of sensible per-
suasion, then does it not follow, there is a higher
evidence of truth than the senses afford, and a
superstantial nature of things implied which,
though now latent and succeeding in order of time,
is first in thought absolutely, and in the circular
progression of nature may be so practically mani-
29 Elements de Psycologie, &c. Paris, 1836.

The True Subject. 167

fested at last ? Aristotle compares the subsistence
of Universals in the natural understanding to
colours, since these require the splendour of the
sun to discover their beauty, as do those the
inspiring afflux of their f ontal illumination : there-
fore, too, he denominates human reason, intellect
in capacity, both on account of its subordination
to essential intellect, and because it is from a new
awakening, a divine recreation, as it were, that
it conceives the full perfection of a life in accord-
ance with its own intelligible beauty, goodness,
and truth.

Thus strictly regarding the Intellectual Law, as
it proves and orders inquiry in common life, we
have an image, as it were, an embryo conception
of that Archetypal Wisdom which the ancients
celebrated as the occult essence of that Law.
And here we remark the grand divergence between
modern and ancient metaphysics : that same Law
which the former recognises but as an abstract
boundary of thought only, having its object in
sensibles, the latter proclaims absolutely to be the
catholic subject of the great efficient force of
nature, as known also, and proved in the human
conscience, when this is purified and passed back
into contacting experience with its source. And
this was Wisdom, Intellect, Divinization ; and
the true man, according to Plato and the Aristo-
telians, is this Intellect ; for the essence of every-
thing is the summit of its nature. And as man
is the summit of this sublunary creation, and
reason is the highest faculty with which he is here
endowed, should not this probably be the next in
progress to make manifest the alleged divinity of
his first source ?

Lest doubt should still lurk, however, about
such a divinity, and whether the notion is rightly
conceived according to the teaching of the best
philosophers, it may be well to bring them forward
here, speaking for themselves.

168 More Esoteric View.

Thus Aristotle, for first example, since he will
not be rated altogether as an enthusiast, in the
beginning of his Metaphysics, declares Wisdom
to be the highest science ; adding that a wise man
possesses a science of all things in intellect ; not
indeed derived from sensible particulars, but
according to that which is universal and absolute
in himself.30 In the Nichomachean Ethics, too,
after showing Intellect to be that power of the soul
by which we know and prove things demon-
stratively, he further distinguishes Wisdom as the
true being of that Intellect ; the science and
intellection of things most honourable by nature ;
that though this part is small in bulk, yet it
abounds in energy, and as much exceeds the
composite nature of man in power as in this
energy, which is the most delectable of all ener-
gies.31 And throughout the Metaphysics, but more
especially in the Twelfth Book, he demonstrates
the necessary subsistence of incorporeal (i.e.y
essential) being, and its efficacy in operation when
by the help of certain mystical exercises and pre-
parations, the human Understanding Medium is
made to pass into contact with its Antecedent
Cause ; that then it becomes to be a life in energy,
and enjoys the most exalted and excellent faculty
of discernment, which was before occult, and the
knowledge of which is inexpressibly blessed, and
not to be conceived of by such as are not duly
initiated and capable of this deification. — True
Intellect, he says, is that which is essentially the
most essential of that which is most essential ; and
it becomes intelligible by contact and intellection ;
and that Intellect is the same with the intelligible,
the understanding recipient of the intelligible
essence.32 Which essence, too, is Wisdom, and the
faculty we are discussing. But Plato yet more

30 Metaphysics, book i. cap. ii.

31 Ethics, book x. cap. vii.

32 Metaphysics, book xii. chap. vii.

The True Subject. 169

plainly declares that to know oneself is Wisdom
and the highest virtue of the soul : for the soul
rightly entering into herself will behold all other
things, and Deity itself ; as verging to her own
union and to the centre of all life, laying aside
multitude and the variety of all manifold powers
which she contains, she ascends to the highest
watch-tower of beings.33 According to Socrates,
also, in the Republic, we read that Wisdom is
generative of truth and intellect ; and in the
Thecetetus Wisdom is defined to be that which
gives perfection to things imperfect, and calls
forth the latent Intellections of the soul — and
again, by Diotima, in the Banquet, that mind
which is become wise needs not to investigate
any further (since it possesses the true Intelligible);
that is to say, the proper object of intellectual
inquiry in itself ; and hence the doctrine of
Wisdom according to Plato may be sufficiently
obvious.

But Wisdom, says the Pythagorean Archytas, as
much excels all the other faculties as sight does the
other corporeal senses, or the sun the stars : and
man was constituted to the end that he might
contemplate the Reason of the whole nature, in
order that, being himself the work of Wisdom, he
might survey the Wisdom of the things, which
exist. Wisdom is not conversant with a certain
definite existing thing but simply with all things ;
and so subsists with reference to all that it is the
province of it to know and contemplate the univer-
sal accidents of things and discover the Principles
of all Being. Whoever therefore is able to analyze
all the genera which are contained under one and
the same principle and again to compose and con-
numerate them, he appears to be wise and to possess
the most perfect veracity. Further still he will
have discovered a beautiful place of survey, from

33 See the First Aleibiades, page 90 ; and Proclus on the
Theology of Plato, lib. i. cap. iii. p. 7. Taylor.

170 More Esoteric View.

which it will be possible to behold Divinity and
all things that are in co-ordination with and suc-
cessive to Him, subsisting separately and distinct
from each other. Having likewise entered this most
ample road, being impelled in a right direction by
Intellect, and having arrived at the end of his
course, he will have conjoined ends with beginnings,
and will know that God who is the principle,
middle, and end of all things which are accom-
plished according to justice and right reason.34

Here again we have a faculty discussed which is
far above ordinary reason, since this verges to
sensibles and is dependent on them ; but Wisdom
implies the whole of life, being returned into its
principle, and coming into the consciousness of a
vision at once powerful and sublime. Thus Crito,
of the same school : God so fashioned man as to
comprehend the Good according to right reason,
and gave him a sight called Intellect, which is
capable of beholding God. For it is not possible
without God to discern that which is best or most
beautiful ; nor without Intellect to see God. And
every mortal nature is established (in this life) with
a kindred privation of Intellect ; this however is not
deprived by God but by the essence of generation.35

The term Intellect, as it is here taken in its
highest sense, is synonymous with Wisdom, and
bears the same relation to our Intellectual Law as
does this to the reasoning faculty, being the self-
evident antecedent and end of its inquiry, which,
according to these philosophers, is God. Pythagoras
himself defined Wisdom as the science of truth
which is in all beings ;36 and lamblicus in his life
of this Samian, speaking of Wisdom, says that it is
truly a science which is conversant with the first
and most beautiful objects (i.e., the Divine

:>A See the Fragment given by Taylor in his lamblicus' Life
of Pythagoras.

35 Idem, page 248.

36 Idem, chap. xxix.

The True Subject. 171

Exemplars), and these undecaying, possessing
invariable sameness of subsistence ; but the parti-
cipation of which other things also may be called
beautiful,37 Proclus, Porphyry, the graceful
Plotinus, and others of the Neoplatonists, too
numerous to mention, dilate on the same asserted
ground ; and there is, according to all these philo-
sophers, a Principle of Universal Science latent in
human life, real and efficacious though cognizable
only under certain conditions which they specify,
and wherein reason becomes alone into the sub-
stantive experience of her Law.

This is that which the Egyptians, industrious
searchers of Nature, proclaimed upon their tem-
ple's front, that Man should know himself : and
this advice was meant experimentally and ontolo-
gically, though modern fancy has slighted it and
taken ever}^ Ethnic fable and mythology in a
profane sense. And here we are reminded of a
difficulty in endeavouring to ma,ke these positions
respecting the nature of true Being obvious and
of drawing them into a form related to sensible
intelligence. Every science is difficult to treat of
to the uninitiated mind, and this kind of speculation
more particularly is irrelevant to many and
naturally abstruse. Those to whom nature has
granted such a ray of experience in the inner life
as would otherwise appear favourable to a more
profound investigation, are often indifferent to the
rational ground, and remain accordingly satisfied
in the dreams and deluding visions of an included
imagination ; others more awakened to reason
on the other hand, but in whom the spirit of inquiry
is wholly drawn to externals, disregard as vain
every proposition that does not immediately
address the senses or pander to some apparent
individual interest ; even the most reflective and
educated class have rare inducements in these

37 See the Fragment in Iamblicus' Life of Pythagoras, by
Taylor, chap. ii.

172 More Esoteric View.

days, or permission of leisure sufficient to prose-
cute studies of an abstract nature. But we have
adverted to the independent evidence of Univer-
sals in the human intellect by way of introduction
chiefly, not on their own account abstractly con-
sidered, or so much because the ancients rested
their proofs of internal science thereon ; but
because, having once derived a rational ground of
possibility, we may be better enabled to proceed
with the tradition of the Hermetic mystery and
more tangible effects.

The doctrine of the Hebrew Kabalists is one of
absolute Idealism ; the whole world was before
their eyes as an efflux of Mind, an emanation of the
great superstantial Law of Light ; and that sublime
Commentary the Liber Zohar, beams with the
revelation of the celestial prototype in humanity ;
and kindling into reminiscence the fire which burns
covertly throughout Holy Writ, addresses the
Pentateuch to the understanding of mankind.

These Rabbis explain that in pursuance of a
certain arcane (though not wholly inexplicable)
necessity, creation falls away always for the sake
of individual manifestation, from the conscious-
ness of its primal source ; that the principle of
re-union nevertheless abides in the generated
life of individuals and will in process of time
operate to a restitution and higher perfection than
could have been accomplished if such a fall into
this existence had not taken place. Treating of and
interpreting as divine symbols, the relations of the
Old Testament, they dignify vastly the view of the
whole scheme ; and placing reason over the head
of authority, and inciting man to self-inquiry as
the foundation and comprehending identity of
every other, they unite in one beautiful system
the Religion of Intellect with the Philosophy of
Life.

But it is above all by the supreme position which
they assign to man in the scale of creation that

The True Subject. 173

these Kabalists arrest attention. The Form of man,
says the Rabbi Ben Jochai, contains all that is in
heaven and earth — no form, no world, could exist
before the human prototype ; for all things subsist
by and in it : without it there would be no world,
and in this sense we are to understand these words,
The Eternal has founded the earth upon his wisdom.
But we must distinguish the true man from him
who is here apparent, for the one could not exist
without the other ; on that form in man, which is
the Celestial Prototype, rests the perfection of
faith in all things, and it is in this respect that
man is said to be the image of God.38 For there is
a wide difference between the idols of the human
imagination and the ideas of the divine mind,
between man as he is here known, the individual-
ized multiplication of a blind will, and that
Motive Reason which is his life. And all this would
appear less extravagant, perhaps, and impractical,
if, instead of measuring the surfaces of things, we
were to consider principles ; if, instead of separ-
ating our shrunken understanding to contemplate
and compare with the structure of this vast
universe, we were to reflect contrariwise upon that
wonderful existence which we share in common
with all and which is at the basis of every specifical
living thing. For there is no reason why man, in
that he exists and contains, therefore, within
himself the total Cause of existence, should not, if
the revelation only were allowed, perceive and
understand all, in that all-continental All which is
in himself. There is a freedom, and explanatory
breadth, too, in these writers that does not bear
the impress of mere fancy, with a solemn earnest-
ness of style that breathes only from conviction.
That wre cannot easily apprehend the magnitude
of their doctrine is no proof that it is untrue ; com-
mon sense is no criterion in such a case and its
objections fail before the inference of reason and
supporting experience.

38 Zohar, part i. fol. 191, recto ; part iii. 144, recto.

174 More Exoteric View.

God dwells, says the Jew Philo, in the rational
part of man as in a palace ; the palace and temple
of the great self-existent Deit}^ is the intellectual
portion of a man of Wisdom ; the Deity could
never find upon earth a more excellent temple than
the rational part of man.39 And again, — the Logos,
by whom the world was framed, is the seal after
the impression of which everything is made and
is rendered the similitude and image of the perfect
Word of God ; and the soul of man is an impression
of this seal of which the prototype and original
characteristic is the everlasting Logos.40 And
what is Wisdom according to the ancient Hermes ?
Even the good, the fair, and the blessed Eternity ;
look upon all things through it, and the world is
subject to thy sight. For this Mind in men is God,
and, therefore, are some men said to be divine,
for there humanity is annexed to divinity ;41 when
it is moved into the catholic Intuition of its Source.

Such then was Wisdom, and that high Intelli-
gible which it behoves man to search after, the one
theme and bulwark of ancient science, which no
historical teaching or observance of the accidents
of nature could realise or improve — namely, the
standard of truth in a rectified intellect. And
philosophy was a desire of this kind, an appetition
of reason for its antecedent light ; and if we may
believe these sublime enthusiasts, Intellect does
not extend herself towards the intelligible Cause
in vain. Quotation were endless, and enough may
recur to the memory of those who do not yet
despair of philosophy, or limit their faith to the
slow evidence of the senses and double ignorance
of these days.

39 De Praemiis et Poenis, vol. ii. p. 428, 1. 10, 12. De Nobili-
tate, p. 437.

40 De Profugis, vol. i. p. 549, 1. 49. De Plantatione Noer
p. 332, 1. 31.

41 See the Divine Pimander.

The True Subject. 175

Or, if any one should further doubt of this
Wisdom, seeing she did not reveal herself in
common arts and sciences of more recent human
invention, and regard the whole as an abstract
creature of the imagination, he will err from the
ancient tradition, which makes Wisdom, however
far removed from sensibles, to be no inessential
thing ; but an affirmative operative hypostasis,
informing, invigorating, and sustaining all things ;
in the words of the Stagyrite before cited, — It is
essentially, the most essential of that which is most
essential. — But Solomon, better than all and most
beautifully in his panegyric, describes her : Wis-
dom, says the wise king, is more moving than any
motion, she passeth through all things by reason
of her pureness. For she is the breath of the power
of God, and a pure influence flowing from the glory
of the Almighty ; therefore, can no defiled thing
fall into her ; for she is the brightness of the ever-
lasting light, the unspotted mirror of the power
of God, and the image of his goodness. And, being
but one, she can do all things, and, remaining in
herself, she maketh all things new ; and in all
ages entering into holy souls, she maketh them
friends of God and prophets, for God loveth none
but him that dwelleth with Wisdom ; for she is
more beautiful than the sun and above all the order
of the stars ; being compared with the light, she
is found before it, for after this cometh night ; but
vice shall not prevail against Wisdom ; and if
riches be a possession to be desired in this life, what
is richer than Wisdom which worketh all things ?
for she is priv}^ to the mysteries of the knowledge
of God and a lover of His works.42

Assuredly, then, is it not our duty and best
interest to learn the way, and seek to know every
condition of this proffered alliance, since we are not
destitute either of rational ground or precedent,
nor is this the only place in Scripture where we
42 Wisdom of Solomon, chap. vii.

176 More Esoteric View.

have a promise with Wisdom of more substantial
fruits ? But as we observe the outer man to be
unbelieving by nature and unpromising for much
discovery, with his senses and servile intellect all
dark within, we leave him here to work with his
own instruments on his own ground ; there to
calcine, weigh, and measure circumferences, from
the first to the last round of material possibility ;
perchance then, when all has been tried and found
wanting to his reason, extremes coalescing, we may
meet again.

Meanwhile we, who look directly onward to
penetrate the mystery, seek not at random any
longer in the outer world where so many before have
foundered, albeit extracting their life's blood, and
calling the mumial vapour and every element to
their aid ; but we look within, or rather, that we
may learn how to do so, inquire of the wise
ancients to direct us about the true method and
conditions of Self-Knowledge. For it is this, no
common trance or day-dream, or any fanatical
vision of celestials, that we propose to scrutinize ;
but true psychical experience, catholic, even as
the basis of that Law by which we reason, feel,
and are one, uniformly living and alike all.

It is into the substantiality of this and for its
practical evolution that we must inquire, if we
would discover the true Light of Alchemy ; and
the Alchemists, as we have seen, propose such a
reducation of nature as shall discover this Latex
without destroying her vehicle, but the modal life
only ; and profess that this has not alone been
proved possible, but that man, by rationally
conditionating, has succeeded in developing into
action the Recreative Force. But the way the}^
do not so clearly shew, or where nature may be
addressed in order to the rejection of her super-
fluous forms ; what was their immediate efficient ?
whence and whereon did they direct their fire ?
These things, with the laboratory, its vessels and

The True Subject. 177

various apparatus, they have disguised, as we
have already shown, and as a natural consequence,
by an incurious world have been misapprehended
and despised. For as Geber, with his usual point,
observes, men have thought the confection of
gold impossible, because they have not known the
artificial destruction according to the course of
nature ; they have proved it to be of a strong
composition, but of how strong a composition they
have not proven.

And all this because they knew not the verity
Of altitude, latitude, and of profundity.43

For how should they, who have never glanced
even in imagination towards the Causal Truth,
believe in any other than remote effects ? The
well out of which she is drawn is deep, and not
therefore to be fathomed by the plummet of a
shallow reason ; he must ascend in thought who
would, descending, hope to penetrate so far as to
the superstantial experience of things. For there
it is yet hidden, the true light shut up as in a
prison, the fountain of Universal Nature separated
off from human understanding by the external
attraction of it through the gates of sense.

When the soul is situated in the body, says the
philosopher, she departs from self-contemplation,
and speaks of the concerns of an external life ;
but, becoming purified from body, will recollect
all those things, the remembrance of which she
loses in the present life ;44 and Plutarch, who was
well initiated in these mysteries, says, the souls of
men are not able to participate of the Divine nature
whilst they are thus encompassed about with
senses and passions, any further than by obscure
glimmerings, and as it were, in comparison, a
confused dream. But when they are freed from
hese impediments and removed into purer regions,

43 Invest, of Perf. cap. iii. RusseFs Geber. Bloomfield's
Jamp of Philosophy, v. 27.
44Plotinus' Select Works; Taylor, page 387, &c.

178 More Esoteric View.

which are neither discernible by the corporeal
senses, nor liable to accidents of any kind, it is then
that God becomes our leader — upon Him they
wholly depend, beholding without satiety, and still
ardently longing after that beauty which it is
impossible for man sufficiently to express or think
— that beauty which, according to the old mytho-
logy, Isis has so great an affection for, and which
she is constantly in pursuit of, and from whose
enjoyment every variety of good things with which
the universe is filled, is replenished, and propa-
gated.45 And again, in the opening of the same
admirable treatise, he observes, that to desire and
covet after the Truth is to aspire to be a partaker
of the Divine Nature itself ; and to profess that
all our studies and inquiries are devoted to the
acquisition of holiness ; the end of which, as of all
ceremonial rites and disciplines, was that the
aspirant might be prepared and fitted for the
attainment of the knowledge of the Supreme Mind,
whom the Goddess exhorts them to search after.
For this Reason is her temple wherein the Eternal Self-
exist ent dwells, and may there be finally approached,
but with due solemnity, and sanctity of life.

But Psellus, in his luminous commentary on the
Chaldaic Oracles, further declares that there is no
other means of strengthening the vehicle of the soul
but by material Rites ; and Plato, in the first
Alcibiades, calls the magic of Zoroaster the service
of the gods ; and the use of this magic, in the words
of the above Psellus, is as follows : — To initiate or
perfect the human soul by the power of materials here
on earth ; for the supreme faculty of the soul cannot
by its own guidance aspire to the sublimest institution,
and to the comprehension of Divinity : but the work
of Piety leads it by the hand of God, by illumination
from thence.

Synesius, likewise, in his Treatise on Providence,
bears witness to the efficacy of Divine Works ; and
45 De Tside et Osiride.

The True Subject. 17 &

the Emperor Julian, in those arguments of his
preserved by Cyril, shows that without such
assistance the Divine union is neither effected nor
rightly understood : and all the accounts we read
of the Eleusinian Mysteries, in addition to the
witness of these philosophers, confirms that Wis-
dom was the offspring of a vital experiment into
nature, by certain arts and media producing the
central efficient into conscious being and effect.
If you investigate rightly, says Archytas, discovery
will be easy for you ; but if you do not know how
to investigate, discovery will be impossible.

It is the more to be regretted and wondered at,
on account of the importance attached to this
discovery, that the Initiated were so profoundly
silent upon these means ; since mankind in general
would seem to have been precisely in this predica-
ment, they have not known how to investigate ; and
were it not for these scattered innuendoes and
acknowledgments of an Art, we might well con-
tinue in ignorance to despair of their hidden
ground : at all events, seeing how far we fall short
of the perception in this life ; either believing, we
might regard the ancients as beings superiorly
endowed ; or otherwise disbelieving, deny, as
many have done, the validity of their assertions.
Yet as the case now stands involved in mystery,
will it not be unjust to do either ? For, being
ignorant of the method, how should we presume
to test the truth of this philosophy ? Equally, also,
will it not be incurious to yield an implicit faith ?
Let us inquire now, therefore, if fortunately a ray
of light be left to guide us, whether it be possible
to approach to a recollection of this ancient
experiment, that we may become better judges
of its merits ; and lest gaining nothing by a tacit
assent, and proving nothing by mere scepticism,
we should deny something, and bolt ourselv es con-
tinuously out from the sanctuary of truth in nature.

180 More Esoteric View.

And here we would engage the reader's attention
for a brief interval (weighing well the substance of
philosophical assertion against modern pride and
our growing indifference), to consider the ground
of this Hermetic mystery, and whether there be
still an entrance open, as there was once said to be,
to the shut palaces of Mind. Let us descend into
ourselves, and believe in ourselves if we be able,
that that which we are is worthy our investigation ;
and we may discover, as we proceed, by their
traditional light unfolding it, that the Wisdom
of the ancients was not the outward, adventitious
acquisition or vain display which it has been
supposed to be, but a very real, substantial, and
attainable good.

A spontaneous revelation of truth, if it was ever
indeed enjoyed at all without experimental re-
search, after the Hebrews ceased ; nor was it
longer possible for all, nor at every time, to partake
of the Divine communion. This, therefore, as the
Platonic Successor remarks, our philanthropic lord
and father, Jupiter, understanding, that we might
not be deprived of all communication with the
gods, has given us observation through Sacred Arts,
by which we have at hand sufficient assistance.46

Here, then, we take up our clue to weave onward
as we proceed, unravelling the Mysteries by their
traditional light. The objects encountering this
research may, as we before said, be appalling to
some, nugatory to others, and, at first view, too
opposed we fear to the opinions of all ; but if, by
chance, a less oblivious soul or intellect, more allied
than ordinary to antecedent realities, should find
familiar scenes recur, thrilling into reminiscence,
as of some long past life forgotten ; let such a one
believe, and his faith will not betray him, the
road whereon we are journeying is towards his
Native Land.

46 See Iamblicus on the Mysteries ; Taylor's Notes at the
end, page 367 ; the Greek extract from Julian's Arguments.

The Mysteries. 181