part in alchemical theory, as does its prototype in

mystical theology.
Now, as I have pointed out already, the central theorem of mystical theology is, in Christian termin- ology, that of the regeneration of the soul by the Spirit of Christ. The corresponding process in alchemy is that of the transmutation of the " base " metals into silver and gold by the agency of the Philosopher's Stone. Merely to remove the evil sulphur of the **base" metals, thought the alchemists, though necessary, is not sufficient to transmute them
^ Pseudo-GEBER, whose writings were liighly esteemed, for instance. See R. Russel's translation of his works (1678), p. 160.
QUEST OF PHILOSOPHER'S STONE 135
into " noble " metals ; a maturing process is essential, similar to that which they supposed was effected in Nature's womb. Mystical theology teaches that the powers and life of the soul are not inherent in it, but are given by the free grace of God. Neither, according to the alchemists, are the powers and life of nature in herself, but in that immanent spirit, the Soul of the World, that animates her. As writes the famous alchemist who adopted the pleasing pseudonym of " Basil Valentine " {c. 1600), " the power of growth ... is imparted not by the earth, but by the life-giving spirit that is in it. If the earth were deserted by this spirit, it would be dead, and no longer able to afford nourishment to anything. For its sulphur or richness would lack the quickening spirit without which there can be neither life nor growth." ^ To perfect the metals, therefore, the alchemists argued, from analogy with mystical theology, which teaches that men can be regenerated only by the power of Christ within the soul, that it is necessary to subject them to the action of this world-spirit, this one essence underlying all the varied powers of nature, this One Thing from which '* all things were produced ... by adaption, and which is the cause of all perfection throughout the whole world." 2 "This," writes one alchemist, " 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
^ Basil Valentine : The Twelve Keys. (See The Hermetic Museum, voL i. pp. 333 and 334.)
* From the " Smaragdine Table," attributed to Hermes Trismegistos (ie. Mercury or Thoth). ..r,..-^ v^
136 BYGONE BELIEFS
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." ^ It was this Spirit, concentrated in all its potency in a suitable material form, which the alchemists sought under the name of '' the Philosopher's Stone ''. Now, mystical theology teaches that the Spirit of Christ, by which alone the soul of man can be tinctured and transmuted into the likeness of God, is Goodness itself ; consequently, the alchemists argued that the Philosopher's Stone must be, so to speak. Gold itself, or the very essence of Gold : it was to them, as Christ is of the soul's perfection, at once the pattern and the means of metallic perfection. ** The Philosopher's Stone," declares '* Eiren^eus Phila- LETHES " (nat, c, 1623), *' is a certain heavenly,
^ The Book of the Revelation of Hermes, interpreted by Theo- PHRASTUS Paracelsus, concerning the Supreme Secret of the World. (See Benedictus Figulus, A Golden and Blessed Casket of Nature's Marvels, trans, by A. E. Waite, 1893, pp. 36, 37> and 41.)
QUEST OF PHILOSOPHER'S STONE 137
spiritual, penetrative, and fixed substance, which brings all metals to the perfection of gold or silver (according to the quality of the Medicine), and that by natural methods, v^hich yet in their effects tran- scend Nature. . . . Know, then, that it is called a stone, not because it is like a stone, but only be- cause, by virtue of its fixed nature, it resists the action of fire as successfully as any stone. In species it is gold, more pure than the purest ; it is fixed and in- combustible like a stone [i.e. it contains no outward sulphur, but only inward, fixed sulphur], but its appearance is that of a very fine powder, impalpable to the touch, sweet to the taste, fragrant to the smell, in potency a most penetrative spirit, apparently dry and yet unctuous, and easily capable of tingeing a plate of metal. ... If we say that its nature is spiritual, it would be no more than the truth ; if we described it as corporeal the expression would be equally correct ; for it is subtle, penetrative, glori- fied, spiritual gold. It is the noblest of all created things after the rational soul, and has virtue to repair all defects both in animal and metallic bodies, by restoring them to the most exact and perfect temper ; wherefore is it a spirit or ' quintessence.' " ^ In other accounts the Philosopher's Stone, or at least the materia prima of which it is compounded, is spoken of as a despised substance, reckoned to be of no value. Thus, according to one curious al- chemistic work, '* This matter, so precious by the excellent Gifts, wherewith Nature has enriched it, is truly mean, with regard to the Substances from
^ EiREN^us Philalethes : A Brief Guide to the Celestial Ruby. (See The Hermetic Museum, vol. ii. pp. 246 and 249.)
138 BYGONE BELIEFS
whence it derives its Original. Their price is not above the AbiHty of the Poor. Ten Pence is more than sufficient to purchase the Matter of the Stone. . . . The matter therefore is mean, considering the Foundation of the Art because it costs very Httle ; it is no less mean, if one considers exteriourly that which gives it Perfection, since in that regard it costs nothing at all, in as much as all the World has it in its Power ... so that ... it is a constant Truth, that the Stone is a Thing mean in one Sense, but that in another it is most precious, and that there are none but Fools that despise it, by a just Judgment of God." 1 And Jacob Boehme (1575-1624) writes : " The philosopher's stone is a very dark, disesteemed stone, of a grey colour, but therein lieth the highest tincture.'' 2 In these passages there is probably some reference to the ubiquity of the Spirit of the World, already referred to in a former quotation. But this fact is not, in itself, sufficient to account for them. I suggest that their origin is to be found in the religious doctrine that God's Grace, the Spirit of Christ that is the means of the transmutation of man's soul into spiritual gold, is free to all ; that it is, at once, the meanest and the most precious thing in the whole Universe. Indeed, I think it quite probable that the alchemists who penned the above- quoted passages had in mind the words of Isaiah, '' He was despised and we esteemed him not." And
^ A Discourse between Eudoxus and Pyrophilus, upon the Ancient War of the Knights. See The Hermetical Triumph : or, the Victorious Philosophical Stone (1723), pp. 10 1 and 102.
2 Jacob Boehme : Epistles (trans, by J. E., 1649, reprinted 1886), Ep. iv., § III.
QUEST OF PHILOSOPHER'S STONE 139
if further evidence is required that the alchemists beUeved in a correspondence between Christ — " the Stone which the builders rejected '' — and the Philosopher's Stone, reference may be made to the alchemical work called The Sophie Hydrolith : or Water Stone of the Wise, a tract included in The Hermetic Museum, in which this supposed corre- spondence is explicitly asserted and dealt with in some detail.
Apart from the alchemists' belief in the analogy between natural and spiritual things, it is, I think, incredible that any such theories of the metals and the possibility of their transmutation or " regenera- tion " by such an extraordinary agent as the Philo- sopher's Stone would have occurred to the ancient investigators of Nature's secrets. When they had started to formulate these theories, facts ^ were dis-
^ One of those facts, amongst many others, that appeared to confirm the alchemical doctrines, was the ease with which iron could apparently be transmuted into copper. It was early observed that iron vessels placed in contact with a solu- tion of blue vitriol became converted (at least, so far as their surfaces were concerned) into copper. This we now know to be due to the fact that the copper originally contained in the vitriol is thrown out of solution, whilst the iron takes its place. And we know, also, that no more copper can be obtained in this way from the blue vitriol than is actually used up in preparing it ; and, further, that all the iron which is apparently converted into copper can be got out of the residual solution by appropriate methods, if such be desired ; so that the facts really support D Alton's theory rather than the alchemical doctrines. But to the alchemist it looked like a real transmuta- tion of iron into copper, confirmation of his fond belief that iron and other base metals could be transmuted into silver and gold by the aid of the Great Arcanum of Nature.
140 BYGONE BELIEFS
covered which appeared to support them ; but it is, I suggest, practically impossible to suppose that any or all of these facts would, in themselves, have been sufficient to give rise to such wonderfully fantastic theories as these : it is only from the standpoint of the theory that alchemy was a direct offspring of mysticism that its origin seems to be capable of explanation.
In all the alchemical doctrines mystical connec- tions are evident, and mystical origins can generally be traced. I shall content myself here with giving a couple of further examples. Consider, in the first place, the alchemical doctrine of purification by putrefaction, that the metals must die before they can be resurrected and truly live, that through death alone are they purified — in the more prosaic language of modern chemistry, death becomes oxidation, and rebirth becomes reduction. In many alchemical books there are to be found pictorial symbols of the putrefaction and death of metals and their new birth in the state of silver or gold, or as the Stone itself, together with descriptions of these processes. The alchemists sought to kill or destroy the body or outward form of the metals, in the hope that they might get at and utilise the living essence they believed to be immanent within. As Para- celsus put it : ** Nothing of true value is located in the body of a substance, but in the virtue . . . the less there is of body, the more in proportion is the virtue." It seems to me quite obvious that in such ideas as these we have the application to metallurgy of the mystic doctrine of self-renunciation — that the soul must die to self before it can live to God ; that
To face p. 140.
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QUEST OF PHILOSOPHER'S STONE 141
the body must be sacrificed to the spirit, and the individual will bowed down utterly to the One Divine Will, before it can become one therewith.
In the second place, consider the directions as to the colours that must be obtained in the preparation of the Philosopher's Stone, if a successful issue to the Great Work is desired. Such directions are frequently given in considerable detail in alchemical works ; and, without asserting any exact uniformity, I think that I may state that practically all the al- chemists agree that three great colour- stages are necessary — (i.) an inky blackness, which is termed the " Crow's Head " and is indicative of putrefac- tion ; (ii.) a white colour indicating that the Stone is now capable of converting ** base " metals into silver ; this passes through orange into (iii.) a red colour, which shows that the Stone is now perfect, and will transmute " base " metals into gold. Now, what was the reason for the belief in these three colour-stages, and for their occurrence in the above order ? I suggest that no alchemist actually ob- tained these colours in this order in his chemical experiments, and that we must look for a speculative origin for the belief in them. We have, I think, only to turn to religious mysticism for this origin. For the exponents of religious mysticism unani- mously agree to a threefold division of the life of the mystic. The first stage is called '* the dark night of the soul," wherein it seems as if the soul were deserted by God, although He is very near. It is the time of trial, when self is sacrificed as a duty and not as a delight. Afterwards, however, comes the morning light of a new intelligence, which marks the com-
142 BYGONE BELIEFS
mencement of that stage of the soul's upward pro- gress that is called the " illuminative life *'. All the mental powers are now concentrated on God, and the struggle is transferred from without to the inner man, good works being now done, as it were, spon- taneously. The disciple, in this stage, not only does unselfish deeds, but does them from unselfish motives, being guided by the light of Divine Truth. The third stage, which is the consummation of the process, is termed " the contemplative life ". It is barely describable. The disciple is wrapped about with the Divine Love, and is united thereby with his Divine Source. It is the life of love, as the illumi- native life is that of wisdom. I suggest that the al- chemists, believing in this threefold division of the regenerative process, argued that there must be three similar stages in the preparation of the Stone, which was the pattern of all metallic perfection ; and that they derived their beliefs concerning the colours, and other peculiarities of each stage in the supposed chemical process, from the characteristics of each stage in the psychological process according to mystical theology.
Moreover, in the course of the latter process many flitting thoughts and affections arise and deeds are half- wittingly done which are not of the soul's true character ; and in entire agreement with this, we read of the alchemical process, in the highly esteemed ** Canons '' of D'Espagnet : *' Besides these decre- tory signs [i.e. the black, white, orange, and red colours] which firmly inhere in the matter, and shew its essential mutations, almost infinite colours appear, and shew themselves in vapours, as the Rainbow in
QUEST OF PHILOSOPHER'S STONE 143
the clouds, which quickly pass away and are expelled by those that succeed, more affecting the air than the earth : the operator must have a gentle care of them, because they are not permanent, and proceed not from the intrinsic disposition of the matter, but from the fire painting and fashioning everything after its pleasure, or casually by heat in slight moisture." ^ That D'Espagnet is arguing, not so much from actual chemical experiments, as from analogy with psychological processes in man, is, I think, evident.
As well as a metallic, the alchemists believed in a physiological, application of the fundamental doc- trines of mysticism : their physiology was analogi- cally connected with their metallurgy, the same prin- ciples holding good in each case. Paracelsus, as we have seen, taught that man is a microcosm, a world in miniature ; his spirit, the Divine Spark within, is from God ; his soul is from the Stars, extracted from the Spirit of the World ; and his body is from the earth, extracted from the elements of which all things material are made. This view of man was shared by many other alchemists. The Philosopher's Stone, therefore (or, rather, a solution of it in alcohol) was also regarded as the Elixir of Life ; which, thought the alchemists, would not endow man with physical immortality, as is some- times supposed, but restore him again to the flower of youth, *' regenerating " him physiologically. Fail- ing this, of course, they regarded gold in a potable
^ Jean D'Espagnet: Hermetic Arcanum, canon 65. (See Collectanea Hermetica, ed. by W. Wynn Westcott, vol. i., 1893, pp. 28 and 29.)
144 BYGONE BELIEFS
form as the next most powerful medicine — a belief which probably led to injurious effects in some cases.
Such are the facts from which I think we are justified in concluding, as I have said, *' that the al- chemists constructed their chemical theories for the main part by means of a priori reasoning, and that the premises from which they started were (i.) the truth of mystical theology, especially the doctrine of the soul's regeneration, and (ii.) the truth of mystical philosophy, which asserts that the objects of nature are symbols of spiritual verities." ^
It seems to follow, ex hypothesis that every al- chemical work ought to permit of two interpretations, one physical, the other transcendental. But I would not venture to assert this, because, as I think, many of the lesser alchemists knew little of the origin of their theories, nor realised their significance. They were concerned merely with these theories in their strictly metallurgical applications, and any tran- scendental meaning we can extract from their works was not intended by the writers themselves. How- ever, many alchemists, I conceive, especially the better sort, realised more or less clearly the dual nature of their subject, and their books are to some extent intended to permit of a double interpretation, although the emphasis is laid upon the physical and chemical application of mystical doctrine. And there are a few writers who adopted alchemical termin- ology on the principle that, if the language of theology
^ In the following excursion we will wander again in the alchemical bypaths of thought, and certain objections to this view of the origin and nature of alchemy will be dealt with and, I hope, satisfactorily answered.
QUEST OF PHILOSOPHER'S STONE 145
is competent to describe chemical processes, then, conversely, the language of alchemy must be com- petent to describe psychological processes : this is certainly and entirely true of Jacob Boehme, and, to some extent also, I think, of Henry Khunrath (1560-1605) and Thomas Vaughan (1622-1666).
As may be easily understood, many of the al- chemists led most romantic lives, often running the risk of torture and death at the hands of avaricious princes who believed them to be in possession of the Philosopher's Stone, and adopted such pleasant methods of extorting (or, at least, of trying to extort) their secrets. A brief sketch, which I quote from my Alchemy : Ancient and Modern (1911), § 54, of the lives of Alexander Sethon and Michael Sendivogius, will serve as an example : —
" The date and birthplace of Alexander Sethon, a Scottish alchemist, do not appear to have been recorded, but Michael Sendivogius was probably born in Moravia about 1566. Sethon, we are told, was in possession of the arch-secrets of Alchemy. He visited Holland in 1602, proceeded after a time to Italy, and passed through Basle to Germany ; meanwhile he is said to have performed many trans- mutations. Ultimately arriving at Dresden, how- ever, he fell into the clutches of the young Elector, Christian II., who, in order to extort his secret, cast him into prison and put him to the torture, but with- out avail. Now it so happened that Sendivogius, who was in quest of the Philosopher's Stone, was staying at Dresden, and hearing of Sethon's im- prisonment obtained permission to visit him.
Sendivogius offered to effect Sethon's escape in
10
146 BYGONE BELIEFS
return for assistance in his alchemistic pursuits, to which arrangement the Scottish alchemist wilHngly agreed. After some considerable outlay of money in bribery, Sendivogius's plan of escape was success- fully carried out, and Sethon found himself a free man ; but he refused to betray the high secrets of Hermetic philosophy to his rescuer. However, before his death, which occurred shortly afterwards, he pre- sented him with an ounce of the transmutative powder. Sendivogius soon used up this powder, we are told, in effecting transmutations and cures, and, being fond of expensive living, he married Sethon 's widow, in the hope that she was in the pos- session of the transmutative secret. In this, how- ever, he was disappointed ; she knew nothing of the matter, but she had the manuscript of an alchemistic work written by her late husband. Shortly after- wards Sendivogius printed at Prague a book entitled The New Chemical Light under the name of * Cosmo- polita,' which is said to have been this work of Sethon 's, but which Sendivogius claimed for his own by the insertion of his name on the title page, in the form of an anagram. The tract On Sulphur which was printed at the end of the book in later editions, however, is said to have been the genuine work of the Moravian. Whilst his powder lasted, Sendivogius travelled about, performing, we are told, many transmutations. He was twice imprisoned in order to extort the secrets of alchemy from him, on one occasion escaping, and on the other occasion obtaining his release from the Emperor Rudolph. Afterwards, he appears to have degenerated into an impostor, but this is said to have been a finesse to
QUEST OF PHILOSOPHER'S STONE 147
hide his true character as an alchemistic adept. He died in 1646.'*
However, all the alchemists were not of the apparent character of Sendivogius — many of them leading holy and serviceable lives. The alchemist- physician J. B. Van Helmont (1577-1644), who was a man of extraordinary benevolence, going about treating the sick poor freely, may be particularly mentioned. He, too, claimed to have performed the transmutation of " base " metal into gold, as did also Helvetius (whom we have already met), physician to the Prince of Orange, with a wonderful preparation given to him by a stranger. The testi- mony of these two latter men is very difficult either to explain or to explain away, but I cannot deal with this question here, but must refer the reader to a paper on the subject by Mr Gaston De Mengel, and the discussion thereon, published in vol. i. of The Journal of the Alchemical Society.
In conclusion, I will venture one remark dealing with a matter outside of the present inquiry. Al- chemy ended its days in failure and fraud ; charlatans and fools were attracted to it by purely mercenary objects, who knew nothing of the high aims of the genuine alchemists, and scientific men looked else- where for solutions of Nature's problems. Why did alchemy fail } Was it because its fundamental theorems were erroneous ? I think not. I consider the failure of the alchemical theory of Nature to be due rather to the misapplication of these fundamental concepts, to the erroneous use of a priori methods of reasoning, to a lack of a sufficiently wide knowledge of natural phenomena to which to apply these con-
148 BYGONE BELIEFS
cepts, to a lack of adequate apparatus with which to investigate such phenomena experimentally, and to a lack of mathematical organons of thought with which to interpret such experimental results had they been obtained. As for the basic concepts of alchemy themselves, such as the fundamental unity of the Cosmos and the evolution of the elements, in a word, the applicability of the principles of mysti- cism to natural phenomena : these seem to me to contain a very valuable element of truth — a state- ment which, I think, modern scientific research justifies me in making, — though the alchemists dis- torted this truth and expressed it in a fantastic form. I think, indeed, that in the modern theories of energy and the all-pervading ether, the etheric and electrical origin and nature of matter and the evolution of the elements, we may witness the triumphs of mysticism as applied to the interpretation of Nature. Whether 01 not we shall ever transmute lead into gold, I believe there is a very true sense in which we may say that alchemy, purified by its death, has been proved true, whilst the materialistic view of Nature has been proved false.
X
THE PHALLIC ELEMENT IN ALCHEMICAL DOCTRINE
The problem of alchemy presents many aspects to our view, but, to my mind, the most fundamental of these is psychological, or, perhaps I should say, epis- temological. It has been said that the proper study of mankind is man ; and to study man we must study the beliefs of man. Now so long as we neglect great tracts of such beliefs, because they have- been, or appear to have been, superseded, so long will our study be incomplete and ineffectual. And this, let me add, is no mere excuse for the study of alchemy, no mere afterthought put forward in justification of a predilection, but a plain statement of fact that renders this study an imperative need. There are other questions of interest — of very great interest — concerning alchemy : questions, for instance, as to the scope and validity of its doctrines ; but we ought not to allow their fascination and promise to distract our attention from the fundajgaental problem, whose solution is essential to their elucidation.
In the preceding essay on " The Quest of the Philosopher's Stone," which was written from the standpoint I have sketched in the foregoing words,
149
ISO BYGONE BELIEFS
my thesis was " that the alchemists constructed their chemical theories for the main part by means of a priori reasoning, and that the premises from which they started were (i.) the truth of mystical theology, especially the doctrine of the souFs regeneration, and (ii.)the truth of mystical philosophy, which asserts that the objects of nature are symbols of spiritual verities." Now, I wish to treat my present thesis, which is concerned with a further source from which the alchemists derived certain of their views and modes of expression by means of a priori reasoning, in connection with, and, in a sense, as complementary to, my former thesis. I propose in the first place, therefore, briefly to deal with certain possible objec- tions to this view of alchemy.
It has, for instance, been maintained ^ that the assimilation of alchemical doctrines concerning the metals to those of mysticism concerning the soul was an event late in the history of alchemy, and was undertaken in the interests of the latter doctrines. Now we know that certain mystics of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries did borrow from the al- chemists much of their terminology with which to discourse of spiritual mysteries — Jacob Boehme, Henry Khunrath, and perhaps Thomas Vaughan, may be mentioned as the most prominent cases in point. But how was this possible if it were not, as I have suggested, the repayment, in a sense, of a sort of philological debt ? Transmutation was an admirable vehicle of language for describing the
^ See, for example, Mr A. E. Waite's paper, " The Canon of Criticism in respect of Alchemical Literature," The Journal of the Alchemical Society, vol. i. (1913), pp. 17-30.
PHALLIC ELEMENT IN ALCHEMY 151
soul's regeneration, just because the doctrine of transmutation was the result of an attempt to apply the doctrine of regeneration in the sphere of metal- lurgy ; and similar remarks hold of the other promi- nent doctrines of alchemy.
The wonderful fabric of alchemical doctrine was not woven in a day, and as it passed from loom to loom, from Byzantium to Syria, from Syria to Arabia, from Arabia to Spain and Latin Europe, so its pattern changed ; but it was always woven a priori^ in the belief that that which is below is as that which is above. In its final form, I think, it is distinctly Christian.
In the Turha Philosophorum^ the oldest known work of Latin alchemy — a work which, claiming to be of Greek origin, whilst not that, is certainly Greek in spirit, — we frequently come across statements of a decidedly mystical character. ** The regimen," we read, " is greater than is perceived by reason, except through divine inspiration." ^ Copper, it is insisted upon again and again, has a soul as well as a body ; and the Art, we are told, is to be defined as " the liquefaction of the body and the separation of the soul from the body, seeing that copper, like a man, has a soul and a body." ^ Moreover, other doctrines are here propounded which, although not so obviously of a mystical character, have been traced to mystical sources in the preceding excursion. There is, for instance, the doctrine of purification by means of putrefaction, this process being likened
^ The Turha Philosophorum, or Assembly of the Sages (trans. by A. E. Waite, 1896), p. 128. 2 Ibid., p. 193, cf. pp. 102 and 152.
152 BYGONE BELIEFS
to that of the resurrection of man. " These things being done,'' we read, *' God will restore unto it [the matter operated on] both the soul and the spirit thereof, and the weakness being taken away, that matter will be made strong, and after corruption will be improved, even as a man becomes stronger after resurrection and younger than he was in this world.*' ^ The three stages in the alchemical work — black, white, and red — corresponding to, and, as I maintain, based on the three stages in the life of the mystic, are also more than once mentioned. " Cook them [the king and his wife], therefore, until they become black, then white, afterwards red, and finally until a tingeing venom is produced." ^
In view of these quotations, the alliance (shall I say ?) between alchemy and mysticism cannot be asserted to be of late origin. And we shall find similar statements if we go further back in time. To give but one example : *' Among the earliest authorities," writes Mr Waite, *' the Book of Crates says that copper, like man, has a spirit, soul, and body," the term *' copper " being symbolical and applying to a stage in the alchemical work. But nowhere in the Turha do we meet with the concept of the Philosopher's Stone as the medicine of the metals, a concept characteristic of Latin alchemy, and, to quote Mr Waite again, '' it does not appear that the conception of the Philosopher's Stone as a medicine of metals and of men was familiar to Greek alchemy." ^
^ The Turha Philosophorum, or Assembly of the Sages (trans, by A. E. Waite), p. loi, of. pp. 27 and 197. * Ibid., p. 98, of. p. 29. ^ Ibid., p. 71.
PHALLIC ELEMENT IN ALCHEMY 153
All this seems to me very strongly to support my view of the origin of alchemy, which requires a specifically Christian mysticism only for this specific concept of the Philosopher's Stone in its fully- fledged form. At any rate, the development of al- chemical doctrine can be seen to have proceeded concomitantly with the development of mystical philosophy and theology. Those who are not pre- pared here to see effect and cause may be asked not only to formulate some other hypothesis in explana- tion of the origin of alchemy, but also to explain this fact of concomitant development.
From the standpoint of the transcendental theory of alchemy it has been urged " that the language of mystical theology seemed to be hardly so suitable to the exposition [as I maintain] or concealment of chemical theories, as the language of a definite and generally credited branch of science was suited to the expression of a veiled and symbolical process such as the regeneration of man.'' ^ But such a statement is only possible with respect to the latest days of alchemy, when there was a science of chemistry, definite and generally credited. The science of chemistry, it must be remembered, had no growth separate from alchemy, but evolved therefrom. Of the days before this evolution had been accomplished, it would be in closer accord with the facts to say that theology, including the doctrine of man's regenera- tion, was in the position of ** a definite and generally credited branch of science," whereas chemical pheno- mena were veiled in deepest mystery and tinged with
1 Philip S. Wellby, M.A., in The Journal of the Alchemical Society, vol. ii. (1914), p. 104.
154 BYGONE BELIEFS
the dangers appertaining to magic. As concerns the origin of alchemy, therefore, the argument as to suitability of language appears to support my own theory ; it being open to assume that after formula- tion— that is, in alchemy 's latter days — chemical nomenclature and theories were employed by certain writers to veil heterodox religious doctrine.
Another recent writer on the subject, my friend the late Mr Abdul-Ali, has remarked that " he thought that, in the mind of the alchemist at least, there was something more than analogy between metallic and psychic transformations, and that the whole subject might well be assigned to the doctrinal category of ineffable and transcendent Oneness. This Oneness comprehended all — soul and body, spirit and matter, mystic visions and waking life — and the sharp metaphysical distinction between the mental and the non-mental realms, so prominent during the history of philosophy, was not regarded by these early investigators in the sphere of nature. There was the sentiment, perhaps only dimly ex- perienced, that not only the law, but the substance of the Universe, was one ; that mind was everywhere in contact with its own kindred ; and that metallic transmutation would, somehow, so to speak, signalise and seal a hidden transmutation of the soul." ^
I am to a large extent in agreement with this view. Mr Abdul-Ali quarrels with the term " analogy," and, if it is held to imply any merely superficial resemblance, it certainly is not adequate to my own needs, though I know not what other
1 SijiL Abdul-Ali, in The Journal of the Alchemical Society, vol. ii. (1914), p. 102.
PHALLIC ELEMENT IN ALCHEMY 155
word to use . S wedenborg's term * * correspondence ' ' would be better for my purpose, as standing for an essential connection between spirit and matter, arising out of the causal relationship of the one to the other. But if SwEDENBORG believed that matter and spirit were most intimately related, he nevertheless had a very precise idea of their distinctness, which he formulated in his Doctrine of Degrees — a very exact metaphysical doctrine indeed. The alchemists, on the other hand, had no such clear ideas on the subject. It would be even more absurd to attribute to them a Cartesian dualism. To their ways of thinking, it was by no means impossible to grasp the spiritual essences of things by what we should now call chemical manipulations. For them a gas was still a ghost and air a spirit. One could quote pages in support of this, but I will content myself with a few words from the Turba — the antiquity of the book makes it of value, and anyway it is near at hand. *' Permanent water," whatever that may be, being pounded with the body, we are told, *' by the will of God it turns that body into spirit." And in another place we read that " the Philosophers have said : Except ye turn bodies into not-bodies, and incorporeal things into bodies, ye have not yet dis- covered the rule of operation." ^ No one who could write like this, and believe it, could hold matter and spirit as altogether distinct. But it is equally obvious that the injunction to convert body into spirit is meaningless if spirit and body are held to be identical. I have been criticised for crediting the alchemists " with the philosophic acumen of ^ Op. ciL, pp. 65 and no, cf. p. 154.
156 BYGONE BELIEFS
Hegel," 1 but that is just what I think one ought to avoid doing. At the same time, however, it is ex- tremely difficult to give a precise account of views which are very far from being precise themselves. But I think it may be said, without fear of error, that the alchemist who could say, *' As above, so below,'' ipso facto recognised both a very close con- nection between spirit and matter, and a distinction between them. Moreover, the division thus im- plied corresponded, on the whole, to that between the realms of the known (or what was thought to be known) and the unknown. The Church, whether Christian or pre-Christian, had very precise (com- paratively speaking) doctrine concerning the soul's origin, duties, and destiny, backed up by tremendous authority, and speculative philosophy had advanced very far by the time Plato began to concern himself with its problems. Nature, on the other hand, was a mysterious world of magical happenings, and there was nothing deserving of the name of natural science until alchemy was becoming decadent. It is not surprising, therefore, that the alchemists — these men who wished to probe Nature's hidden mysteries — should reason from above to below ; indeed, unless they had started de novo — as babes knowing nothing, — there was no other course open to them. And that they did adopt the obvious course is all that my former thesis amounts to. In passing, it is interest- ing to note that a sixteenth-century alchemist, who had exceptional opportunities and leisure to study the works of the old masters of alchemy, seems to
^ Vide a rather frivolous review of my Alchemy : Ancient and Modern in The Outlook for 14th January 191 1.
PHALLIC ELEMENT IN ALCHEMY 157
have come to a similar conclusion as to the nature of their reasoning. He writes : " The Sages . . . after having conceived in their minds a Divine idea of the relations of the whole universe . . . selected from among the rest a certain substance, from which they sought to elicit the elements, to separate and purify them, and then again put them together in a manner suggested by a keen and profound observa- tion of Nature.'* ^
In describing the realm of spirit as ex hypothesi known, that of Nature unknown, to the alchemists, I have made one important omission, and that, if I may use the name of a science to denominate a com- plex of crude facts, is the realm of physiology, which, falling within that of Nature, must yet be classed as ex hypothesi known. But to elucidate this point some further considerations are necessary touching the general nature of knowledge. Now, facts may be roughly classed, according to their obviousness and frequency of occurrence, into four groups. There are, first of all, facts which are so obvious, to put it paradoxically, that they escape notice ; and these facts are the commonest and most frequent in their occurrence. I think it is Mr Chesterton who has said that, looking at a forest one cannot see the trees because of the forest ; and, in The Innocence of Father Brown, he has a good story (** The Invisible Man '') illustrating the point, in which a man renders himself invisible by dressing up in a post- man's uniform. At any rate, we know that when a
^ Edward Kelly : The Humid Path. (See The Alchemical Writings of Edward Kelly, edited by A. E. Waite, 1893, pp. 59-60.)
iS8 BYGONE BELIEFS
phenomenon becomes persistent it tends to escape observation ; thus, continuous motion can only be appreciated with reference to a stationary body, and a noise, continually repeated, becomes at last in- audible. The tendency of often-repeated actions to become habitual, and at last automatic, that is to say, carried out without consciousness, is a closely related phenomenon. We can understand, there- fore, why a knowledge of the existence of the atmo- sphere, as distinct from the wind, came late in the history of primitive man, as, also, many other curious gaps in his knowledge. In the second group we may put those facts which are common, that is, of fre- quent occurrence, and are classed as obvious. Such facts are accepted at face-value by the primitive mind, and are used as the basis of explanation of facts in the two remaining groups, namely, those facts which, though common, are apt to escape the attention owing to their inconspicuousness, and those which are of infrequent occurrence. When the mind takes the trouble to observe a fact of the third group, or is confronted by one of the fourth, it feels a sense of surprise. Such facts wear an air of strangeness, and the mind can only rest satisfied when it has shown them to itself as in some way cases of the second group of facts, or, at least, brought them into rela- tion therewith. That is what the mind — at least the primitive mind — means by " explanation ". "It is obvious,'' we say, commencing an argument, thereby proclaiming our intention to bring that which is at first in the category of the not-obvious, into the category of the obvious. It remains for a more sceptical type of mind — a later product of
PHALLIC ELEMENT IN ALCHEMY 159
human evolution — to question obvious facts, to ex- plain them, either, as in science, by estabHshing deeper and more far-reaching correlations between phenomena, or in philosophy, by seeking for the source and purpose of such facts, or, better still, by both methods.
Of the second class of facts — those common and obvious facts which the primitive mind accepts at face-value and uses as the basis of its explanations of such things as seem to it to stand in need of ex- planation— one could hardly find a better instance than sex. The universality of sex, and the inter- mittent character of its phenomena, are both re- sponsible for this. Indeed, the attitude of mind I have referred to is not restricted to primitive man ; how many people to-day, for instance, just accept sex as a fact, pleasant or unpleasant according to their predilections, never querying, or feeling the need to query, its why and wherefore ? It is by no means surprising, that when man first felt the need of satisfying himself as to the origin of the universe, he should have done so by a theory founded on what he knew of his own generation. Indeed, as I queried on a former occasion, what other source of explana- tion was open to him ? Of what other form of origin was he aware } Seeing Nature springing to life at the kiss of the sun, what more natural than that she should be regarded as the divine Mother, who bears fruits because impregnated by the Sun-God ? It is not difficult to understand, therefore, why primitive man paid divine honours to the organs of sex in man and woman, or to such things as he considered symbolical of them — that is to say, to understand
i6o BYGONE BELIEFS
the extensiveness of those religions which are grouped under the term '' phalHcism ". Nor, to my mind, is the symbol of sex a wholly inadequate one under which to conceive of the origin of things. And, as I have said before, that phallicism usually appears to have degenerated into immorality of a very pro- nounced type is to be deplored, but an immoral view of human relations is by no means a necessary corol- lary to a sexual theory of the universe.^
^ " The reverence as well as the worship paid to the phallus, in early and primitive days, had nothing in it which partook of indecency ; all ideas connected with it were of a reverential and religious kind. . . .
" The indecent ideas attached to the representation of the phallus were, though it seems a paradox to say so, the results of a more advanced civilization verging towards its decline, as we have evidence at Rome and Pompeii. . . .
" To the primitive man [the reproductive force which per- vades all nature] was the most mysterious of all manifesta- tions. The visible physical powers of nature — the sun, the sky, the storm — naturally claimed his reverence, but to him the generative power was the most mysterious of all powers. In the vegetable world, the live seed placed in the ground, and hence germinating, sprouting up, and becoming a beautiful and umbrageous tree, was a mystery. In the animal world, as the cause of all life, by which all beings came into existence, this power was a mystery. In the view of primitive man generation was the action of the Deity itself. It was the mode in which He brought aU things into existence, the sun, the moon, the stars, the world, man were generated by Him. To the productive power man was deeply indebted, for to it he owed the harvests and the flocks which supported his life ; hence it naturally became an object of reverence and worship.
" Primitive man wants some object to worship, for an abstract idea is beyond his comprehension, hence a visible representation of the generative Deity was made, with the organs contributing to generation most prominent, and hence
PHALLIC ELEMENT IN ALCHEMY i6i
The Aruntas of Australia, I believe, when dis- covered by Europeans, had not yet observed the connection between sexual intercourse and birth. They believed that conception was occasioned by the woman passing near a churinga — a peculiarly shaped piece of wood or stone, in which a spirit- child was concealed, which entered into her. But archaeological research having established the fact that phallicism has, at one time or another, been common to nearly all races, it seems probable that the Arunta tribe represents a deviation from the normal line of mental evolution. At any rate, an isolated phenomenon, such as this, cannot be held to controvert the view that regards phallicism as in this normal line. Nor was the attitude of mind that not only accepts sex at face-value as an obvious fact, but uses the concept of it to explain other facts, a merely transitory one. We may, indeed, not diffi- cultly trace it throughout the history of alchemy, giving rise to what I may term '' The Phallic Element in Alchemical Doctrine ''.
In aiming to establish this, I may be thought to be endeavouring to establish a counter-thesis to that of the preceding essay on alchemy, but, in virtue of the alchemists' belief in the mystical unity of all things, in the analogical or correspondential relation- ship of all parts of the universe to each other, the mystical and the phallic views of the origin of alchemy are complementary, not antagonistic. Indeed, the assumption that the metals are the symbols of man
the organ itself became a symbol of the power." — H. M. Westropp : Primitive Symbolism as Illustrated in Phallic Worship, or the Reproductive Principle (1885), pp. 47, 48, and 57.
II
i62 BYGONE BELIEFS
almost necessitates the working out of physiological as well as mystical analogies, and these two series of analogies are themselves connected, because the prin- ciple '* As above, so below " was held to be true of man himself. We might, therefore, expect to find a more or less complete harmony between the two series of symbols, though, as a matter of fact, con- tradictions will be encountered when we come to consider points of detail . The undoubtable antiquity of the phallic element in alchemical doctrine pre- cludes the idea that this element was an adventitious one, that it was in any sense an afterthought ; not- withstanding, however, the evidence, as will, I hope, become apparent as we proceed, indicates that mystical ideas played a much more fundamental part in the genesis of alchemical doctrine than purely phallic ones — mystical interpretations fit alchemical processes and theories far better than do sexual in- terpretations ; in fact, sex has to be interpreted some- what mystically in order to work out the analogies fully and satisfactorily.
As concerns Greek alchemy, I shall content myself with a passage from a work On the Sacred Art, attributed to Olympiodorus (sixth century a.d.), followed by some quotations from and references to the Turba, In the former work it is stated on the authority of HoRUS that " The proper end of the whole art is to obtain the semen of the male secretly, seeing that all things are male and female. Hence [we read further] Horus says in a certain place : Join the male and the female, and you will find that which is sought ; as a fact, without this process of re-union, nothing can succeed, for Nature
PHALLIC ELEMENT IN ALCHEMY 163
charms Nature," etc. The Turba insistently com- mands those who would succeed in the Art, to con- join the male with the female, ^ and, in one place, the male is said to be lead and the female orpiment.^ We also find the alchemical work symbolised by the growth of the embryo in the womb. ** Know,'' we are told, "... that out of the elect things nothing becomes useful without conjunction and regimen, because sperma is generated out of blood and desire. For the man mingling with the woman, the sperm is nourished by the humour of the womb, and by the moistening blood, and by heat, and when forty nights have elapsed the sperm is formed. . . . God has constituted that heat and blood for the nourish- ment of the sperm until the foetus is brought forth. So long as it is little, it is nourished with milk, and in proportion as the vital heat is maintained, the bones are strengthened. Thus it behoves you also to act in this Art.'' ^
The use of the mystical symbols of death (putre- faction) and resurrection or rebirth to represent the consummation of the alchemical work, and that of the phallic symbols of the conjunction of the sexes and the development of the foetus, both of which we have found in the Turba, are current throughout the course of Latin alchemy. In The Chymical Marriage of Christian Rosencreutz, that extraordinary document of what is called " Rosicrucianism " — a symbolic romance of considerable ability, whoever its author
1 Vide pp. 60, 92, 96, 97, 134, 135 and elsewhere in Mr Waite's translation.
2 Ibid., p. 57.
3 Ibid., pp. 179-181 (second recension) ; cf. pp. 103-104.
i64 BYGONE BELIEFS
was,^ — an attempt is made to weld the two sets of symbols — the one of marriage, the other of death and resurrection unto glory — into one allegorical narrative ; and it is to this fusion of seemingly disparate concepts that much of its fantasticality is due. Yet the con- cepts are not really disparate ; for not only is the second birth like unto the first, and not only is the resurrection unto glory described as the Bridal Feast of the Lamb, but marriage is, in a manner, a form of death and rebirth. To justify this in a crude sense, I might say that, from the male standpoint at least, it is a giving of the life-substance to the beloved that life may be born anew and increase. But in a deeper sense it is, or rather should be, as an ideal, a mutual sacrifice of self for each other's good — a death of the self that it may arise with an enriched personality.
It is when we come to an examination of the ideas at the root of, and associated with, the alchemical concept of *' principles," that we find some difficulty in harmonising the two series of symbols — the mystical and the phallic. In one place in the Turha we are directed ** to take quicksilver, in which is the male potency or strength " ; ^ and this concept of mercury as male is quite in accord with the mystical origin I have assigned in the preceding excursion to the doctrine of the alchemical principles. I have shown, I think, that salt, sulphur, and mercury are the analogues ex hypothesi of the body, soul (aff^ection and volition), and spirit (intelligence or understand-
^ See Mr Waite's The Real History of the Rosicrucians (1887) for translation and discussion as to origin and significance. The work was first published (in German) at Strassburg in 1616. * Mr Waite's translation, p. 79.
PHALLIC ELEMENT IN ALCHEMY 165
ing) in man ; and the affections are invariably re- garded as especially feminine, the understanding as especially masculine. But it seems that the more common opinion, amongst Latin alchemists at any rate, was that sulphur was male and mercury female. Writes Bernard of Trevisan : *' For the Matter suffereth, and the Form acteth assimulating the Matter to itself, and according to this manner the Matter naturally thirsteth after a Form, as a Woman desireth an Husband, and a Vile thing a precious one, and an impure a pure one, so also ^r^^w^-^/^^ covet eth a Sulphur, as that which should make perfect which is imperfect : So also a Body freely desireth a Spirit, whereby it may at length arrive at its perfection." ^ At the same time, however, Mercury was regarded as containing in itself both male and female potencies — it was the product of male and female, and, thus, the seed of all the metals. " Nothing in the World can be generated,'' to repeat a quotation from Bernard, '' without these two Substances, to wit a Male and Female : From whence it appeareth, that although these two substances are not of one and the same species, yet one Stone doth thence arise, and although they appear and are said to be two Substances, yet in truth it is but one, to wit. Argent- vive. But of this Argent-vive a certain part is fixed and digested. Masculine, hot, dry and secretly in- forming. But the other, which is the Female, is volatile, crude, cold, and moyst." ^ Edward Kelly
^ Bernard, Earl of Trevisan : A Treatise of the Philo- sopher s Stone, 1683. (See Collectanea Chymica : A Collection of Ten Several Treatises ifi Chymistry, 1684, p. 92.)
2 Ihid., p. 91.
i66 BYGONE BELIEFS
(^5S5~^S95)> who is valuable because he summarises authoritative opinion, says somewhat the same thing, though in clearer words : " The active elements . . . these are water and fire . . . may be called male, while the passive elements . . . earth and air . . . represent the female principle. . . . Only two elements, water and earth, are visible, and earth is called the hiding-place of fire, water the abode of air. In these two elements we have the broad law of limitation which divides the male from the female. . . . The first matter of minerals is a kind of viscous water, mingled with pure and impure earth. ... Of this viscous water and fusible earth, or sul- phur, is composed that which is called quicksilver, the first matter of the metals. Metals are nothing but Mercury digested by different degrees of heat." ^ There is one difference, however, between these two writers, inasmuch as Bernard says that " the Male and Female abide together in closed Natures ; the Female truly as it were Earth and Water, the Male as Air and Fire." Mercury for him arises from the two former elements, sulphur from the two latter.^ And the difference is important as showing beyond question the a priori nature of alchemical reasoning. The idea at the back of the alchemists' minds was undoubtedly that of the ardour of the male in the act of coition and the alleged, or perhaps I should
^ Edward Kelly : The Stone of the Philosophers. (See The Alchemical Writings 0/ Edward Kelly, edited by A. E. Waite, 1893, pp. 9 and II to 13.)
2 The Answer of Bernardus Trevisanus, to the Epistle of Thomas of Bononia, Physician to K. Charles the 8th. (See John Frederick Houpreght: Aurifontina Chymica, 1680, p. 208.)
PHALLIC ELEMENT IN ALCHEMY 167
say apparent, passivity of the female. Consiequently, sulphur, the fiery principle of combustion, and such elements as were reckoned to be active, were denomi- nated " male,'' whilst mercury, the principle acted on by sulphur, and such elements as were reckoned to be passive, were denominated " female ". As to the question of origin, I do not think that the palm can be denied to the mystical as distinguished from the phallic theory. And in its final form the doctrine of principles is incapable of a sexual interpretation. Mystically understood, man is capable of analysis into two principles — since ** body " may be neglected as unimportant (a false view, I think, by the way) or " soul " and " spirit " may be united under one head — or into three ; whereas the postulation of three principles on a sexual basis is impossible. Joannes Isaacus Hollandus (fifteenth century) is the earliest author in whose works I have observed explicit mention of three principles, though he refers to them in a manner seeming to indicate that the doctrine was no new one in his day. I have only read one little tract of his ; there is nothing sexual in it, and the author's mental character may be judged from his remarks concerning '' the three flying spirits " — taste, smell, and colour. These, he writes, " are the life, soule, and quintessence of every thing, neither can these three spirits be one without the other, as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost are one, yet three Persons, and one is not without the other." ^
1 One Hundred and Fourteen Experiments and Cures of the Famous Physitian Theophrastus Paracelsus. Whereunto is added . . . certain Secrets of Isaac Hollandus, concerning the Vegetall and Animall Work (1652), pp. 29 and 30.
1 68 BYGONE BELIEFS
When the alchemists described an element or principle as male or female, they meant what they said, as I have already intimated, to the extent, at least, of firmly believing that seed was produced by the two metallic sexes. By their union metals were thought to be produced in the womb of the earth ; and mines were shut in order that by the birth and growth of new metal the impoverished veins might be replenished. In this way, too, was the magnum opus, the generation of the Philosopher's Stone — in species gold, but purer than the purest — to be accom- plished. To conjoin that which Nature supplied, to foster the growth and development of that which was thereby produced ; such was the task of the alchemist. " For there are Vegetables,'' says Bernard of Trevisan in his Answer to Thomas of Bononia, " but Sensitives more especially, which for the most part beget their like, by the Seeds of the Male and Female for the most part concurring and conmixt by copulation ; which work of Nature the Philosophick Art imitates in the generation of gold." 1
Mercury, as I have said, was commonly regarded as the seed of the metals, or as especially the female seed, there being two seeds, one the male, according to Bernard, " more ripe, perfect and active," the other the female. ** more immature and in a sort passive. 2 ** . . . our Philosophick Art," he says in another place, following a description of the genera- tion of man, *' . . .is like this procreation of Man ; for as in Mercury (of which Gold is by Nature generated in Mineral Vessels) a natural conjunction ^ Op. cit., p. 2i6. 2 2i)i^^^ p, 217 ; cf. p. 236.
PHALLIC ELEMENT IN ALCHEMY 169
is made of both the Seeds, Male and Female, so by our artifice, an artificial and like conjunction is made of Agents and Patients.'' ^ " All teaching,'' says Kelly, " that changes Mercury is false and vain, for this is the original sperm of metals, and its mois- ture must not be dried up, for otherwise it will not dissolve," 2 and quotes Arnold {ob. c. 13 10) to a similar effect.^ One wonders how far the fact that human and animal seed is fluid influenced the alchemists in their choice of mercury, the only metal liquid at ordinary temperatures, as the seed of the metals. There are, indeed, other good reasons for this choice, but that this idea played some part in it, and, at least, was present at the back of the alchemists' minds, I have little doubt.
The most philosophic account of metallic seed is that, perhaps, of the mysterious adept ** Eiren^us Philalethes," who distinguishes between it and mercury in a rather interesting manner. He writes : '' Seed is the means of generic propagation given to all perfect things here below ; it is the perfection of each body ; and anybody that has no seed must be regarded as imperfect. Hence there can be no doubt that there is such a thing as metallic seed. . . . All metallic seed is the seed of gold ; for gold is the in- tention of Nature in regard to all metals. If the base metals are not gold, it is only through some accidental hindrance ; they are all potentially gold. But, of course, this seed of gold is most easily obtainable from well-matured gold itself. . . . Remember that I am now speaking of metallic seed, and not of
^ The Answer of Bernardus Trevisanus, etc. Op. cit., p. 218. 2 Qp f^n^^ p 22. 3 iijI^^^ ^ i5^
170 BYGONE BELIEFS
Mercury. . . . The seed of metals is hidden out of sight still more completely than that of animals ; nevertheless, it is within the compass of our Art to extract it. The seed of animals and vegetables is something separate, and may be cut out, or other- wise separately exhibited ; but metallic seed is dif- fused throughout the metal, and contained in all its smallest parts ; neither can it be discerned from its body : its extraction is therefore a task which may well tax the ingenuity of the most experienced philo- sopher ; the virtues of the whole metal have to be intensified, so as to convert it into the sperm of our seed, which, by circulation, receives the virtues of superiors and inferiors, then next becomes wholly form, or heavenly virtue, which can communicate this to others related to it by homogeneity of matter. . . . The place in which the seed resides is — approxi- mately speaking — water ; for, to speak properly and exactly, the seed is the smallest part of the metal, and is invisible ; but as this invisible presence is diffused throughout the water of its kind, and exerts its virtue therein, nothing being visible to the eye but water, we are left to conclude from rational induction that this inward agent (which is, properly speaking, the seed) is really there. Hence we call the whole of the water seed, just as we call the whole of the grain seed, though the germ of life is only a smallest particle of the grain." ^
To say that " Philalethes' " seed resembles the modern electron is, perhaps, to draw a rather fanciful analogy, since the electron is a very precise idea, the
^ EiREN^us Philalethes : The Metamorphosis of Metals. (See The Hermetic Museum, vol. ii. pp. 238-240.)
To face p. 170.
PLATE
Fig. 43.
Symbolic Alchemical Design illustrating the Conjunction of Brother and Sister, from Michael Maier's Atalanta Fugiens (161 7).
{By permission of the British Museum. Photo by Donald Macbeth, London.)
PHALLIC ELEMENT IN ALCHEMY 171
result of the mathematical interpretation of the results of exact experimentation. But though it would be absurd to speak of this concept of the one seed of all metals as an anticipation of the electron, to apply the expression " metallic seed " to the electron, now that the concept of it has been reached, does not seem so absurd.
According to " Philalethes," the extraction of the seed is a very difficult process, accomplishable, however, by the aid of mercury — the water homo- geneous therewith. Mercury, again, is the form of the seed thereby obtained. He writes : ** When the sperm hidden in the body of gold is brought out by means of our Art, it appears under the form of Mercury, whence it is exalted into the quintessence which is first white, and then, by means of con- tinuous coction, becomes red." And again : " There is a womb into which the gold (if placed therein) will, of its own accord, emit its seed, until it is de- bilitated and dies, and by its death is renewed into a most glorious King, who thenceforward receives power to deliver all his brethren from the fear of death.'' 1
The fifteenth-century alchemist Thomas Norton was peculiar in his views, inasmuch as he denied that metals have seed. He writes : " Nature never multipHes anything, except in either one or the other of these two ways : either by decay, which we call putrefaction, or, in the case of animate creatures, by propagation. In the case of metals there can be no propagation, though our Stone exhibits something
^ EiRENiEUS Philalethes I The Metamorphosis of Metals. (See The Hermetic Museum, vol. ii. pp. 241 and 244.)
172 BYGONEIBELIEFS
like it. . . . Nothing can be multiplied by inward action unless it belong to the vegetable kingdom, or the family of sensitive creatures. But the metals are elementary objects, and possess neither seed nor sensation." ^
His theory of the origin of the metals is ^.stral rather than phallic. ** The only efficient cause of metals,'* he says, '* is the mineral virtue, which is not found in every kind of earth, but only in certain places and chosen mines, into which the celestial sphere pours its rays in a straight direction year by year, and according to the arrangement of the metallic sub- stance in these places, this or that metal is gradually formed." 2
In view of the astrological symbolism of these metals, that gold should be masculine, silver feminine, does not surprise us, because the idea of the mas- culinity of the sun and the femininity of the moon is a bit of phallicism that still remains with us. It was by the marriage of gold and silver that very many alchemists considered that the magnum opus was to be achieved. Writes Bernard of Trj^visan : *' The subject of this admired Science [alchemy] is Sol and Luna, or rather Male and Female, the Male is hot and dry, the Female cold and moyst." The aim of the work, he tells us, is the extraction of the spirit of gold, which alone can enter into bodies and tinge them. Both Sol and Luna are absolutely necessary, and '* whoever . . . shall think that a Tincture can be made without these two Bodyes,
^ Thomas Norton : The Ordinal of Alchemy. (See The Hermetic Museum, vol. ii. pp. 15 and 16.) * Ihid., pp. 15 and 16.
To face p. 172
PLATE 23.
Fig. 44.
Symbolic Alchemical Design illustrating Lactation, from Maier's
Atalanta Fugiens.
(By permission of the British Museum. Photo by Donald Macbeth, London.)
PHALLIC ELEMENT IN ALCHEMY 173
... he proceedeth to the Practice Hke one that is blind." 1
Kelly has teaching to the same effect, the Mercury of the Philosophers being for him the menstruum or medium wherein the copulation of Gold with Silver is to be accomplished. Mercury, in fact, seems to have been everything and to have been capable of effecting everything in the eyes of the alchemists. Concerning gold and silver, Kelly writes : '' Only one metal, viz. gold, is absolutely perfect and mature. Hence it is called the perfect male body. . . Silver is less bounded by aqueous immaturity than the rest of the metals, though it may indeed be regarded as to a certain extent impure, still its water is already covered with the congealing vesture of its earth, and it thus tends to perfection. This condition is the reason why silver is everywhere called by the Sages the perfect female body.'' And later he writes : " In short, our whole Magistery consists in the union of the male and female, or active and passive, elements through the mediation of our metallic water and a proper degree of heat. Now, the male and female are two metallic bodies, and this I will again prove by irrefragable quotations from the Sages." Some of the quotations will be given : " Avicenna : * Purify husband and wife separately, in order that they may unite more intimately ; for if you do not purify them, they cannot love each other. By con- junction of the two natures you get a clear and lucid nature, which, when it ascends, becomes bright and serviceable.' . . . Senior : * I, the Sun, am hot
^ Bernard, Earl of Tr^visan : A Treatise, etc., Op. cit., pp. 83 and 87.
174 BYGONE BELIEFS
and dry, and thou, the Moon, are cold and moist ; when we are wedded together in a closed chamber, I will gently steal away thy soul.' . . . Rosinus : ' When the Sun, my brother, for the love of me (silver) pours his sperm {i.e. his solar fatness) into the chamber {i.e. my Lunar body), namely, when we become one in a strong and complete complexion and union, the child of our wedded love will be born.' . . . ' Rosary ' : ' Th^^rment of jthe Sun is the spjerntof the~-4rian, the_ierment_Qf -the ^jVIoon , the sperm. of Jjiejwoman . Of both we^t a chaste union mid a true generation.' . . . Aristotle : ' Take your beloved son, and wed him to his sister, his white sister, in equal marriage, and give them the cup of love, for it is a food which prompts to union.' " ^ Kelly, of course, accepts the traditional authorship of the works from which he quotes, though in many cases such authorship is doubtful, to say the least. The alchemical works ascribed to Aristotle (384-322 B.C.), for instance, are beyond question forgeries. In- deed, the symbol of a union between brother and sister, here quoted, could hardly be held as acceptable to Greek thought, to which incest was the most abominable and unforgiveable sin. It seems likelier that it originated with the Egyptians, to whom such unions were tolerable in fact. The symbol is often met with in Latin alchemy. Michael Maier (1568- 1622) also says : " Conjunge fratrem cum sorore et propina illis poculum amoris^^ the words forming a motto to a picture of a man and woman clasped in each other's arms, to whom an older man offers a
^ Edward Kelly : The Stone of the Philosophers, Op. cit., pp. 13, 14, 33, 35, 36, 38-40, and 47.
To face p. 174.
PLATE 24.
Fig. 45.
Symbolic Alchemical Design illustrating the Conjunction of Gold and Silver (or Sun and Moon), from Maier's Atalanta Fugiens.
(By permission of the British Museum. Phcto by Donald Macbeth, London.)
PHALLIC ELEMENT IN ALCHEMY 175
goblet. This symbolic picture occurs in his Atalanta Fugiens, hoc est, Emhlemata nova de Secretis Naturce Chymica, etc. (Oppenheim, 1617). This work is an exceedingly curious one. It consists of a number of carefully executed pictures, each accompanied by a motto, a verse of poetry set to music, with a prose text. Many of the pictures are phallic in conception, and practically all of them are anthropomorphic. Not only the primary function of sex, but especially its secondary one of lactation, is made use of. The most curious of these emblematic pictures, perhaps, is one symbolising the conjunction of gold and silver. It shows on the right a man and woman, representing the sun and moon, in the act of coition, standing up to the thighs in a lake. On the left, on a hill above the lake, a woman (with the moon as halo) gives birth to a child. A boy is coming out of the water towards her. The verse informs us that : ** The bath glows red at the conception of the boy, the air at his birth." We learn also that " there is a stone, and yet there is not, which is the noble gift of God. If God grants it, fortunate will be he who shall receive it." ^
Concerning the nature of gold, there is a discussion in The Answer o/Bernardus Trevisanus to the Epistle of Thomas of Bononia, with which I shall close my consideration of the present aspect of the subject. Its interest for us lies in the arguments which are used and held to be valid. ** Besides, you say that Gold, as most think, is nothing else than Quick-silver coagulated naturally by the force of Sulphur ; yet so, that nothing of the Sulphur which generated the Gold, doth remain in the substance of the Gold : as 1 Op, cit., p. 145.
176 BYGONE BELIEFS
in an humane Embryo, when it is conceived in the Womb, there remains nothing of the Father's Seed, according to Aristotle's opinion, but the Seed of the Man doth only coagulate the menstrual blood of the Woman : in the same manner you say, that after Quick-silver is so coagulated, the form of Gold is perfected in it, by virtue of the Heavenly Bodies, and especially of the Sun." ^ Bernard, however, decides against this view, holding that gold contains both mercury and sulphur, for ** we must not imagine, according to their mistake who say, that the Male Agent himself approaches the Female in the coagu- lation, and departs afterwards ; because, as is known in every generation, the conception is active and passive : Both the active and the passive, that is, all the four Elements, must always abide together, otherwise there would be no mixture, and the hope of generating an off-spring would be extinguished." ^
In conclusion, I wish to say something of the role of sex in spiritual alchemy. But in doing this I am venturing outside the original field of inquiry of this essay and making a by no means necessary addition to my thesis ; and I am anxious that what follows should be understood as such, so that no confusion as to the issues may arise.
In the great alchemical collection of J. J. Manget, there is a curious work (originally published in 1677), entitled Mutus Liber, which consists entirely of plates, without letterpress. Its interest for us in our present concern is that the alchemist, from the commencement of the work until its achievement, is
^ Op. cit., pp. 206 and 207. 2 Ibid., pp. 212 and 213.
To face p. 176.
PLATE 25
Fig. 46. Symbolic Alchemical Design from Mutus Liber (1677).
PHALLIC ELEMENT IN ALCHEMY 177
shown working in conjunction with a woman. We are reminded of Nicolas Flamel (1330-1418), who is reputed to have achieved the magnum opus together with his wife Pernelle, as well as of the many other women workers in the Art of whom we read. It would be of interest in this connection to know exactly what association of ideas was present in the mind of Michael Maier when he commanded the alchemist : '' Perform a work of women on the molten white lead, that is, cook,'' ^ and illustrated his behest with a picture of a pregnant woman watch- ing a fire over which is suspended a cauldron and on which are three jars. There is a cat in the back- ground, and a tub containing two fish in the fore- ground, the whole forming a very curious collection of emblems. Mr Waite, who has dealt with some of these matters, luminously, though briefly, says : " The evidences with which we have been dealing concern solely the physical work of alchemy and there is nothing of its mystical aspects. The Mutus Liber is undoubtedly on the literal side of metallic transmutation ; the memorials of Nicholas Flamel are also on that side," etc. He adds, however, that *' It is on record that an unknown master testified to his possession of the mystery, but he added that he had not proceeded to the work because he had failed to meet with an elect woman who was necessary thereto '' ; and proceeds to say : ** I suppose that the statement will awaken in most minds only a vague sense of wonder, and I can merely indicate in a few general words that which I see behind it. Those Hermetic texts which bear a spiritual interpretation
^ Michael Maier: Atalanta Fugiens (1617), p. 97.
12
178 BYGONE BELIEFS
and are as if a record of spiritual experience present, like the literature of physical alchemy, the following aspects of symbolism : (a) the marriage of sun and moon ; (b) of a mystical king and queen ; (c) an union between natures which are one at the root but diverse in manifestation ; (d) a transmutation which follows this union and an abiding glory therein. It is ever a conjunction between male and female in a mystical sense ; it is ever the bringing together by art of things separated by an imperfect order of things ; it is ever the perfection of natures by means of this conjunction. But if the mystical work of alchemy is an inward work in consciousness, then the union between male and female is an union in consciousness ; and if we remember the traditions of a state when male and female had not as yet been divided, it may dawn upon us that the higher alchemy was a practice for the return into this ineffable mode of being. The traditional doctrine is set forth in the Zohar and it is found in writers like Jacob Boehme ; it is intimated in the early chapters of Genesis and, according to an apocryphal saying of Christ, the kingdom of heaven will be manifested when two shall be as one, or when that state has been once again attained. In the light of this construction we can understand why the mystical adept went in search of a wise woman with whom the work could be performed ; but few there be that find her, and he confessed to his own failure. The part of woman in the physical practice of alchemy is like a reflection at a distance of this more exalted process, and there is evidence that those who worked in metals and sought for a material elixir knew that
To face p. 178.
PLATE 26.
Fig. 47.
Symbolic Alchemical Design illustrating the Work of Woman, from Maier's Atalanta Fugiens.
{By permission of the British Museum. Photo by Donald Macbeth, London. )
PHALLIC ELEMENT IN ALCHEMY 179
there were other and greater aspects of the Hermetic mystery." ^
So far Mr Waite, whose impressive words I have quoted at some length ; and he has given us a fuller account of the theory as found in the Zohar in his valuable work on The Secret Doctrine in Israel (19 13). The Zohar regards marriage and the performance of the sexual function in marriage as of supreme im- portance, and this not merely because marriage symbolises a divine union, unless that expression is held to include all that logically follows from the fact, but because, as it seems, the sexual act in marriage may, in fact, become a ritual of tran- scendental magic.
At least three varieties of opinion can be traced from the view of sex we have under consideration, as to the nature of the perfect man, and hence of the most adequate symbol for transmutation. Accord- ing to one, and this appears to have been Jacob Boehme's view, the perfect man is conceived of as non-sexual, the male and female elements united in him having, as it were, neutralised each other. According to another, he is pictured as a hermaphro- ditic being, a concept we frequently come across in alchemical literature. It plays a prominent part in Maier's book Atalanta Fugiens, to which reference has already been made. Maier's hermaphrodite has two heads, one male, one female, but only one body, one pair of arms, and one pair of legs. The two sexual organs, which are placed side by side, are delineated in the illustrations with considerable care,
^ A. E. Waite : " Woman and the Hermetic Mystery/' The Occult Review (June 1912), vol. xv. pp. 325 and 326.
i8o BYGONE BELIEFS
showing the importance Maier attached to the idea. This concept seems to me not only crude, but un- natural and repellent. But it may be said of both the opinions I have mentioned, that they confuse between union and identity. It is the old mistake, with respect to a lesser goal, of those who hope for absorption in the Divine Nature and consequent loss of personahty. It seems to be forgotten that a certain degree of distinction is necessary to the joy of union. '' Distinction '' and " separation," it should be remembered, have different connotations. If the supreme joy is that of self-sacrifice, then the self must be such that it can be continually sacrificed, else the joy is a purely transitory one, or rather, is destroyed at the moment of its consummation. Hence, though sacrificed, the self must still remain itself.
The third view of perfection, to which these re- marks naturally lead, is that which sees it typified in marriage. The mystic-philosopher Sweden- BORG has some exceedingly suggestive things to say on the matter in his extraordinary work on Conjugial Love, which, curiously enough, seem largely to have escaped the notice of students of these high mysteries.
Swedenborg's heaven is a sexual heaven, because for him sex is primarily a spiritual fact, and only secondarily, and because of what it is primarily, a physical fact ; and salvation is hardly possible, according to him, apart from a genuine marriage (whether achieved here or hereafter). Man and woman are considered as complementary beings, and it is only through the union of one man with
To face p. i8o.
PLATE 27.
Fig. 48.
Symbolic Alchemical Design, Hermaphrodite, from Maier's Atalanta
Fugiens.
{By permission of the British Museum. Pfioto by Donald Macbeth, London.)
PHALLIC ELEMENT IN ALCHEMY i8i
one woman that the perfect angel results. The altru- istic tendency of such a theory as contrasted with the egotism of one in which perfection is regarded as obtainable by each personality of itself alone, is a point worth emphasising. As to the nature of this union, it is, to use Swedenborg's own terms, a con- junction of the will of the wife with the understanding of the man, and reciprocally of the understanding of the man with the will of the wife. It is thus a manifestation of that fundamental marriage be- tween the good and the true which is at the root of all existence ; and it is because of this funda- mental marriage that all men and women are born into the desire to complete themselves by con- junction. The symbol of sexual intercourse is a legitimate one to use in speaking of this heavenly union ; indeed, we may describe the highest bliss attainable by the soul, or conceivable by the mind, as a spiritual orgasm. Into conjugial love ** are collected," says Swedenborg, *' all the blessednesses, blissfulnesses, delightsomenesses, pleasantnesses, and pleasures, which could possibly be conferred upon man by the Lord the Creator." ^ In another place he writes : ** Married partners [in heaven] enjoy similar intercourse with each other as in the world, but more delightful and blessed ; yet without proli- fication, for which, or in place of which, they have spiritual prolification, which is that of love and wis- dom." " The reason," he adds, " why the inter- course then is more delightful and blessed is, that when conjugial love becomes of the spirit, it becomes
1 Emanuel Swedenborg : The Delights of Wisdom relating to Conjugial Love (trans, by A. H. Searle, 1891), § 68.
i82 BYGONE BELIEFS
more interior and pure, and consequently more per- ceptible; and every delightsomeness grows accord- ing to the perception, and grows even until its blessed- ness is discernible in its delightsomeness." ^ Such love, however, he says, is rarely to be found on earth. A learned Japanese speaks with approval of Idealism as a " dream where sensuousness and spirituality find themselves to be blood brothers or sisters." 2 It is a statement which involves either the grossest and most dangerous error, or the pro- foundest truth, according to the understanding of it. Woman is a road whereby man travels either to God or the devil. The problem of sex is a far deeper problem than appears at first sight, involving mysteries both the direst and most holy. It is by no means a fantastic hypothesis that the inmost mystery of what a certain school of mystics calls ** the Secret Tradition " was a sexual one. At any rate, the fact that some of those, at least, to whom alchemy connoted a mystical process, were alive to the pro- found spiritual significance of sex, renders of double interest what they have to intimate of the achieve- ment of the Magnum Opus in man.
* Emanuel Swedenborg : Op. cit., § 51.
2 YoNE NoGUCHi : The Spirit of Japanese AH (1915), p. 37.
XI
ROGER BACON : AN APPRECIATION
It has been said that " a prophet is not without honour, save in his own country.'* Thereto might be added, " and in his own time " ; for, whilst there is continuity in time, there is also evolution, and England of to-day, for instance, is not the same country as England of the Middle Ages. In his own day Roger Bacon was accounted a magician, whose heretical views called for suppression by the Church. And for many a long day afterwards was he mainly remembered as a co-worker in the black art with Friar Bungay, who together with him con- structed, by the aid of the devil and diabolical rites, a brazen head which should possess the power of speech — the experiment only failing through the negligence of an assistant.^ Such was Roger Bacon in the memory of the later Middle Ages and many succeeding years ; he was the typical alchemist,
^ The story, of course, is entirely fictitious. For further particulars see Sir J. E. Sandys' essay on " Roger Bacon in English Literature," in Roger Bacon Essays (1914), referred to below.
183
i84 BYGONE BELIEFS
where that term carries with it the depth of disrepute, though indeed alchemy was for him but one, and that not the greatest, of many interests.
Ilchester, in Somerset, claims the honour of being the place of Roger Bacon's birth, which interesting and important event occurred, probably, in 1214. Young Bacon studied theology, philosophy, and what then passed under the name of *' science," first at Oxford, then the centre of liberal thought, and afterwards at Paris, in the rigid orthodoxy of whose professors he found more to criticise than to admire. Whilst at Oxford he joined the Franciscan Order, and at Paris he is said, though this is probably an error, to have graduated as Doctor of Theology. During 1 250-1 256 we find him back in England, no doubt engaged in study and teaching. About the latter year, however, he is said to have been banished — on a charge of holding heterodox views and indulging in magical practices — to Paris, where he was kept in close confinement and forbidden to write. Mr Little,^ however, believes this to be an error, based on a misreading of a passage in one of Bacon's works, and that Roger was not imprisoned, but stricken with sickness. At any rate it is not im- probable that some restrictions as to his writing were placed on him by his superiors of the Franciscan Order. In 1266 Bacon received a letter from Pope Clement asking him to send His Holiness his works in writing without delay. This letter came as a most pleasant surprise to Bacon ; but he had nothing of importance written, and in great haste and excite-
^ See his contribution, " On Roger Bacon's Life and Works," to Roger Bacon Essays.
To face />. 184
PLATE
|mti0:S>^ A€>.\>tktu ^smgrn.^ t fmitmatart
Fig. 49.
Roger Bacon presenting a Book to a King, from a Fifteenth-century
Miniature in the Bodleian Library, Oxford.
[Note. — There is no contemporary portrait of Roger Bacon known, so that the authenticity of every one of the portraits alleged to be of him is open to doubt. The two reproduced in figs. 49 and 50 are probably the oldest extant, and are therefore the most worthy of respect. That from the Bodleian Library is reproduced by kind permission of the authorities, and is, I think, the earliest known portrait of Bacon. The Knole Castle portrait (fig. 50) is by an un- known artist, probably of the Elizabethan period. It is reproduced by permission of Ladv Sackville,]
ROGER BACON: AN APPRECIATION 185
ment, therefore, he composed three works expUcating his philosophy, the Opus Majus, the Opus Minus, and the Opus TertiuMy which were completed and dis- patched to the Pope by the end of the following year. This, as Mr Rowbottom remarks, is '' surely one of the literary feats of history, perhaps only surpassed by Swedenborg when he wrote six theological and philosophical treatises in one year." ^
The works appear to have been well received. We next find Bacon at Oxford writing his Compen- dium Studii Philosophice, in which work he indulged in some by no means unjust criticisms of the clergy, for which he fell under the condemnation of his order, and was imprisoned in 1277 ^^ ^ charge of teaching *^ suspected novelties ". In those days any knowledge of natural phenomena beyond that of the quasi-science of the times was regarded as magic, and no doubt some of Roger Bacon's ** suspected novelties '' were of this nature ; his recognition of the value of the writings of non- Christian moralists was , no doubt , another ' * suspected novelty ' ' . Appeals for his release directed to the Pope proved fruitless, being frustrated by Jerome D'Ascoli, General of the Franciscan Order, who shortly afterwards suc- ceeded to the Holy See under the title cf Nicholas