History of Alchemy
ALCHEMY
By Suzzette Moulin
Gold: “the metal
is so rare that if every grain taken from the earth since time began
were
melted into a
single cube, it would measure less than nineteen yards to a side.
No
civilization has attained greatness without it; its loss has toppled
empires. Yet since humans first held the metal’s entrancing shimmer and
associated it with the life-giving sun, gold has been treasured far
beyond its value as the medium of wealth and power. It is the metal of
gods, fashioned by virtually all cultures into their most revered
objects.
“[Gold]
artifacts…manifest enlightenment, purity, and immortality. To the
alchemists, who sought to create gold from baser matter, their highest
aim was not mere riches, but divinity itself.” (2)
ALCHEMY
IS A SYSTEM OF THOUGHT:
ALCHEMY’S BEGINNINGS:
OCCULT KNOWLEDGE
LEADING THE WAY TO GOD:
MARIA THE JEWESS:
FROM PHYSICAL
SCIENCE TO PHILOSOPHICAL INQUIRY:
ARISTOTLE:
FOUR ELEMENTS:
ASTROLOGY:
ALCHEMISTS PERSECUTED:
PHILOSOPHER’S STONE:
AVICENNA:
THREE CATEGORIES OF
ALCHEMISTS:
EMPEDOCLES AND FOUR ELEMENTS:
THE ESSENCE OF METALS:
JOURNEY OF THE SPIRIT:
REDEMPTIVE GRACE THROUGH
ALCHEMY:
PARACELSUS:
ALCHEMY THE BASIS FOR
MODERN CHEMISTRY:
HARMONIOUS INTERCONNECTEDNESS:
PHILOSOPHY VERSUS PRAGMATISM:
ALCHEMICAL INFLUENCES:
TRANSMUTATION:
References
ALCHEMY
IS A SYSTEM OF THOUGHT:
Alchemy is a
paradigm or system of thought that spans the entire Old World with
regional dialects that tend to confirm a common origin.(1) It is an
ancient art/science (described by the American Academics Encyclopedia as
a pseudoscience) concerned with the transmutation of base metals (the
more reactive metals) into gold and with the discovery of both a single
cure for all diseases and a way to prolong life indefinitely.
Gold carries an
aura of mystical power because it is immutable (incapable of being
changed). Because gold does not rust, tarnish or decay it symbolizes
incorruptibility and immortality. The modern day chemical symbol for
gold, Au, is taken from the Latin word meaning “shining dawn”. To the
Hindus it was the mineral light, a physical token of divine
intelligence. To the Incas it was the sweat of the sun. In
pre-Columbian Central and South America the gold used for body
adornments was valued for its ability to reflect the brilliance of
sunlight and was worn to represent entry into the kingdom of the sun
god. In ancient China the radiance of gold was seen as a manifestation
of super-natural omnipotence and eternal spiritual values. Because of
the immutability of gold, objects made from it reinforce an object’s
symbolic connection to eternal life.
ALCHEMY’S BEGINNINGS:
Alchemy emerged as
a “pseudoscience” in China and in Egypt during the early centuries of
this era. In China it was associated with Taoist philosophy and
purported to transmute base metals into gold by use of a “medicine”.
Gold that was produced by transmutation was thought to be a cure for
diseases and to prolong life. The mystical element was always strong in
alchemy and with time became more dominant than the physical chemistry
so that alchemy in China degenerated into a complex of superstitions.
OCCULT KNOWLEDGE
LEADING THE WAY TO GOD:
One of the factors
that influenced the paradigm of alchemy in ancient Egypt was the variety
of religious creeds found there. In Alexandria there were followers of
the native Egyptian rites, the cults of the Romans, there were many
Jewish synagogues and Christianity also exerted its influence with a
number of competing sects. There were also various mystery cults from
the East which introduced secret rituals of rebirth and purification and
an orientation toward mystical union with God. Amid all these
contrasting religious viewpoints, occult beliefs abounded. Students of
alchemy could adopt ideas from this assortment of creeds. A strong
belief of alchemists was that occult knowledge leads the mind to
perfection and saw knowledge as a way to bring gold to God.
For alchemists
this belief had practical significance. To obtain the perfection of
gold, they reasoned they had only to free the essence of gold from the
base materials that imprisoned it. They devised a number of procedures
to accomplish this process of liberation.
MARIA THE JEWESS:
One laboratory
worker in Egypt was a woman referred to as Maria the Jewess. She lived
during the second century A.D. in Alexandria and was known for designing
laboratory equipment and using it in original ways. One of Maria’s
inventions, a water bath, is the same double boiler found in kitchens
today. It is still known in Spanish as bano de Maria and in French as
bain-marie. Her main contribution was an apparatus called the kerotakis,
used for heating alchemical substances and collecting their vapors, a
process now called distillation. The kerotakis was an airtight vessel
with a piece of copper foil at the top. When the alchemists heated
their various compounds of sulfur, arsenic and mercury, the fumes would
condense on the foil and the copper tended to change colors, giving the
impression that it was taking on the spirit of gold. For the apparatus
to function properly all of its connections had to be vacuum tight. The
use of such containers in the Hermetic arts gave rise to the expression
“hermetically sealed”. Her most complex apparatus was the tribukos
which is a 3-beaked alembic. (An alembic is any vessel used for
distillation.)
FROM PHYSICAL
SCIENCE TO PHILOSOPHICAL INQUIRY:
The transformation
of alchemy from a physical science to a philosophical inquiry began in
the Nile basin, the heart of the ancient world’s gold supply, and it
stemmed from the sophisticated skills developed by the metalsmiths of
Egypt. The jewelers and goldsmiths of that civilization often doubled
as temple priests and court officials. Their technical skills were
astonishing to others and they were seen as wizards. In some primitive
societies the metal worker is often a member of an occult religious
society and is seen as a healer.
Alchemy is
believed to have had its roots in the practical skill of the craftsmen
of ancient Egypt, many of whom acquired great skill in treating metals
in such a way as to counterfeit the more costly gold. Mixed with Greek
philosophy, Babylonian astrology, Muslim idealism, Christian mysticism
and Aristotlean theory of the composition of matter, the study of metals
flourished in the Middle Ages as alchemy and it has handed down to our
own time some of the concepts with which it became involved.
ARISTOTLE:
Aristotle and his
contemporaries believed that gold was a living substance, that it grew
like carrots in the soil, and that lesser metals had a natural tendency
to transmute themselves into more valuable substances. They believed
all nature – like the human race – was intent on self-improvement. In
Aristotle’s words “Nature and God are working towards an end, striving
for what is perfect”. Gold, being the most nearly perfect metal, was
the obvious end product of these spontaneous changes. The skilled
metalsmith helped nature carry out its work by smelting ores (a basic
transmutation), and was seen as the art of using fire to rearrange the
elements and make it possibl e to turn base metals into gold and to
“grow” more gold by incorporating it into an alloy. Heat was
fundamental to most alchemical experiments and fire was thought of as
the sacred facilitator.
FOUR ELEMENTS:
Aristotle taught
that all matter was composed of 4 elements: water, earth, fire and
air. According to his theory different materials found in nature had
different ratios of these 4 elements. Therefore, by proper treatment a
base metal changed into gold. These ideas were further supported by
astrological speculations.
ASTROLOGY:
Astrologers
believed that celestial bodies – the Sun, the Moon and the Stars – had a
profound influence on the activities of humans. They believed that
events in the macrocosm of the natural world were reflected in the human
microcosm and vice versa. Thus, under the proper astrological
influences a “perfection” or “healing” of lead into gold might occur,
just as the human soul could achieve a perfect state in heaven. The
artisan in a laboratory could perhaps hasten this process by careful
nurture and long heating, by “killing” the metal and then “reviving” it
into a finer form.
Thus for
alchemists to transmute metals effectively the planets had to be in a
favorable configuration and they confined their work to particular
phases of the moon. Astrological influences led to ascribing each metal
a heavenly body: e.g., gold to the Sun, silver to the Moon, copper to
Venus and iron to Mars.
ALCHEMISTS PERSECUTED:
As in China and
later in Western Europe, the alchemical writing in Alexandria became
allegorical and confusing. At the end of the 4th century the
destruction of the academy and its library scattered the alchemists from
Alexandria to Byzantium, Syria and countries in the Near East. There
they were persecuted by governments and the church as practitioners of
black magic.
PHILOSOPHER’S STONE:
The Arab
alchemists modified the Aristotlean concept of 4 elements by postulating
that all metals were composed of 2 immediate components: sulfur and
mercury. They also adopted the Chinese alchemists’ concept of a
“philosopher’s stone” – a medicine that could turn a “sick” (base) metal
into gold and also act as an elixir of life. (An elixir is a substance
believed to prolong life indefinitely.)
AVICENNA:
One famous Persian
alchemist was Avicenna (980-1036), an important physician and proponent
of massage therapy for health. He authored 450 books, among them The
Book of Healing and The Canon of Medicine. He is considered to be the
father of modern medicine. He was interested in the effect of the mind
on the body. He and other Arabian alchemists discovered new chemicals
now called alkalies. What brought Europe out of the Dark Ages was the
wide-spread use of soap and glass. The manufacture of these two
products requires the use of alkalies; thus, large scale commercial
production o f soap and glass spurred the economy.
With the fall of
Rome, Greek science and philosophy declined in Western Europe. Close
contact with Arabs in Spain in the 11th and 12th
centuries brought a new interest in Arabic philosophers, physicians and
scientists. The alchemist became a recognizable figure on the European
scene and kings and nobles often supported alchemy in hopes of
increasing their resources. Frequently alchemists who failed to produce
the promised gold lost their lives.
THREE CATEGORIES OF
ALCHEMISTS:
Alchemists seem to
fall into 3 categories. There were many who saw in the “Hermetic art” a
possible way to wealth by means of converting metals to gold for their
own enrichment. This accounts for the fact that many princes and nobles
of Europe kept an alchemist in their employment, and frequently in
captivity, so that the great secret of transmutation when unlocked
should go no further. Some alchemists, however, were those who
investigated nature from much the same curiosity that is the motive of
modern scientists. Others hoped to find a remedy for all ills, or a
secret medicine which would produce ageless long life. And t here were
those whose motives were primarily religious in that they believed the
physical order of things to be a kind of key to the celestial
arrangements of God.
EMPEDOCLES AND FOUR ELEMENTS:
Some of the
notions of alchemy were carried over from the Pythagoreans and
particularly from Empedocles, who considered all things to be composed
of different proportions of 4 basic elements: Earth, Air, Fire, and
Water. An example of this is a log burning in the grate. The fire is
obviously there, flaming and glowing’ smoke comes out of the wood and
vanishes into the air; water bubbles from the grain at the end of the
log; and all that is eventually left is ash (the earth element), smaller
in both weight and volume than the original log. The wood has gone,
having been dissociated into these 4 elements.
These elements
were held by the alchemists to be no more than different forms or
manifestations of a single basic matter, and any substance had its own
particular properties according to the proportions in which these forms
were mixed. Fire plus Earth gave dryness, Air plus Water endowed things
with wetness. Fire and Air together gave warmth and Earth and Water
were seen together in coldness.
THE ESSENCE OF METALS:
The alchemists
were particularly fascinated by metals, and the fact that these were
found in veins in the earth strongly suggested that they actually grew
there like plants, from original seeds. Many alchemists clearly
regarded metals as alive and as immortal, in the sense that one could
dissolve them or transmute them without killing them. There was more to
a metal than the qualities endowed by the 4 ancient elements, and to
explain the difference a new concept was introduced in the form of
Mercury (capital M Mercury) not the modern element Hg, or
quicksilver.
Mercury,
or “philosophical mercury” as it has sometimes been called, was said to
be the basis of all metals, which only differed from each other in the
amounts of specific qualities such as hardness, softness, luster and the
like which were added to it. From this it followed that any metal could
in theory be reduced to Mercury, which could then be built up
again into gold (or any other metal) by adding the appropriate
qualities. The research of alchemists depended on being able to obtain
the Mercury and it was generally believed that it could most
easily be obtained from mercury, which contained less in the way of
additional qualities than d id other metals. If from mercury one
removed the wetness and fluidity, the color and the heaviness or
earthiness, then one would have Mercury in all its naked purity.
Mercury, seen in this way, would appear to be an abstraction,
just as roundness is the abstraction remaining if one imagines a rubber
ball and divests it of color, texture and rubberiness. But to the
alchemists Mercury was not a mere abstract concept, for they
believed that it could be prepared by purification and would be found at
the bottom of a crucible once the necessary purgings of a metal had been
carried out.
Mercury
was the chief material but not the only one. Sulfur, (not
identical with yellow sulfur, but a “philosophical sulfur” endowing
things with color and combustion) and Salt (again, not sodium
chloride, but “philosophical salt”, the principle of earthiness endowing
metals with solidity and resistance to fire) were two other main
materials. On this theory copper would be a complex of Mercury
with an addition of Sulfur (which accounted for the color)
whereas iron owed its hardness to a greater proportion of Salt.
These three principle materials or “tria prima”, Mercury,
Sulfur and Salt, were seen by many alchemists as
manifestations of the interaction of the 4 elements of Empedocles.
JOURNEY OF THE SPIRIT:
People worked in
laboratories and libraries searching for the ingredient that would
transmute ordinary matter into gold. They studied manuscripts and stood
before furnaces, stirring up sulfurous powders and evil-smelling
potions. They may have sacrificed health and fortune in the course of
this work. And over time the search itself underwent a transformation.
What had begun as a quest for riches changed into a journey of the
spirit. The work of the alchemist began to reach into the highest
levels of philosophical inquiry; if gold was matter in its perfect form
– a metallic sunshine – then any person who learned to create it would
certainly take on the attributes of d ivinity. The successful alchemist
would be wise, powerful and quite possibly immortal.
“The religious
overtones of alchemy seem to have come in by two different means. In
the first place, if a man spent his life and fortune in an unsuccessful
effort to prepare Mercury and build it into gold, then clearly
there was something amiss. Today a scientist might conclude that his
premises were false, but to the alchemist this was virtually
inconceivable. A much more reasonable explanation was that the failure
was the will of God, and that the deity had baulked the investigation
either because of his dissatisfaction with the moral character or
devotions of the experimenter, or because the secrets themselves could
only be apprehended by those who were fit to understand their spiritual
significance.< SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
An alchemist would therefore have his “oratory” as
a complement to his “laboratory”, and surviving prints of alchemists
frequently show the chemist at prayer before beginning an experiment.
REDEMPTIVE GRACE THROUGH
ALCHEMY:
But there was
another and closer connection with religious belief. If metals were one
in essence and differed only in the extent to which they had purity on
the one hand or baseness or corruption on the other, they mirrored the
situation of man himself. Gold was the purest, proof against rust and
corrosion, its luster undimmed by fire, and able to withstand the attack
of all solvents except “aqua regia”. It was like regenerate man,
resplendent and shining with a perfection which could withstand the
wiles of the devil and pass unscathed through the fire of hell. Lead
however was fallen, misconceived, easily melted by fire, and so dirty
that it marked the fingers – a p arallel indeed to fallen and sinful
man. Granted that lead could be redeemed to pure gold, and that sinful
man could be restored to perfection by the grace of God, then the
transmutation of metals was something in the nature of a chemical
parallel to the redemption of man. And this suggested that true insight
into the nature of redemptive grace might be obtained by achieving the
corresponding transformation in metallurgy.”(3)
An alchemist could
therefore be viewed as a chemist, a metallurgist and a theologian.
PARACELSUS:
In time alchemy
fell into disrepute because of the nefarious character of some of its
practitioners. Practical alchemists turned from trying to make gold to
preparing medicinals. A leader in this movement was a Swiss-German
alchemist, Phillippus Aureolus Paracelsus (1493-1531).
Paracelsus “was
one of the first to understand the nature of the circulation of blood,
which he called the sap of life. He was among the first physicians to
treat epilepsy as a disease and not as a symptom of demonic possession
or lunacy. He made the connection between miner’s lung disease called
silicosis and the inhalation of metal vapors. Until then its victims
had been told that their illness was given to them by the mountain
spirits as punishment for sins. He described the causes, symptoms and
diagnosis of syphilis and specified the first treatment that relied on
precisely measured doses of mercury compounds taken orally by the
patient. (Almost 400 years later, in the 20th century, a
similar treatment was still being prescribed.)
“Paracelsus’s
alchemical research in pursuit of the elixir of life also led him to
extract the ‘quinta essentia’ of the poppy. The result was the
discovery of laudanum, an opium derivative that he prescribed as a pain
killer in the form of “three black pills”. And by combining alcohol and
sulfuric acid, he prepared ether-like drugs that could be used to induce
sleep.
“A Renaissance
infirmary run according to Paracelsian principles provided its patients
with rest, a healthful diet and loving care.
“He was one of the
first physicians to stress examination of the patient. It was
considered unnecessary by most physicians of the time who believed all
disease was caused by internal imbalances of blood, phlegm and bile.”(2)
Medical chemistry
emerged under his influence: at the same time he was also an advocate
of folk remedies.
“Paracelsus
believed that each human being, representing the microcosm, was linked
to the cosmos, or macrocosm, and that whatever had an effect upon the
one would have a similar effect upon the other. Health emanated from
God, the “Great Physician”, and sickness, as Paracelsus saw it, was
merely a breakdown in the celestial harmony that normally exists between
nature and humankind, or macrocosm and microcosm. To restore health,
the physician had to restore the balance through the use of chemical
remedies, which he called arcana. In these works the
physician-alchemist also was compelled to rely on mediation of such
influences as the rays of stars and what Paracelsus called vaguely “the
breath of the Lord”.”(2)
He believed alchemy to be the
foundation of medicine, along with philosophy, astrology and the
occult. He thought the real purpose of alchemy should be to produce
medicines rather than to transmute metals. At the same time, he had a
good understanding of the chemistry of metals and believed in
transmutation. He viewed the body as a chemical system whose
functioning was governed by vital spirits. The function of medicine was
to restore the body to homeostasis. He also believed that diseases were
cured by arcana, essences prepared by the alchemist by distillation,
percolation, extraction and similar operations. A particular Arcanum
should be effective against a particular disease. This point of view
led Paracelsus and his followers to experiment with a wide variety of
chemicals, giving rise to medical chemistry and thus enhancing the
pharmacopoeias of the 1600’s.
“Paracelsus believed in the Greek
concept of the four elements, but he also believed that on another level
the cosmos was fashioned from three spiritual substances, the tria prima
(Mercury, Sulfur and Salt). These three substances
gave every object its inner essence and outward form….This alchemical
trinity defined the human identity as well. Sulfur embodied the
soul, which was seen to be the emotions and desires; Salt
represented the body; Mercury epitomized the spirit, comprising
imagination, moral judgment, and the higher mental faculties.
“For Paracelsus the connection
between these attributes and alchemy was obvious. Only by understanding
the chemical nature of the tria prima could a physician discover the
precise arcana needed to cure a specific disease.”(2) For Paracelsus
the goal of alchemy was not to pursue gold but to cure disease.
In the writings of Paracelsus
reference is made both to specifics and to a general elixir which he
calls “quintessence”: “The quintessence, then, is a certain matter
extracted from all things which Nature has produced, and from everything
which has life corporeally in itself, a matter most subtly purged of all
impurities and mortality, and separated from all the elements. From
this it is evident that the quintessence is a nature, a force, a virtue,
and a medicine, once shut up within things, but now free from any
domicile and from all outward incorporation….Now the fact that the
quintessence cures all diseases does not arise from temperature, but
from an innate property, namely, its great cleanliness and purity, by
which, after a wonderful manner, it alte rs the body into its own
purity, and entirely changes it.”(1)
He adds that “each disease requires
its own special quintessence”, though there are some which can be used
for any disease.
ALCHEMY THE BASIS FOR
MODERN CHEMISTRY:
Classical
scholarship in the 16th century shifted attention away from
Aristotlean theory and toward Greek atomism. The chemical facts that
had been accumulated by alchemists as a by-product of their search for
gold became the basis for modern chemistry.
“The mid-1600’s
stand out as a watershed in the intellectual evolution of Western
society. It was a time when the balance of mainstream intellectual
values began to tip away from its enduring dependence on arcane systems
such as philosophical alchemy and toward a new outlook shaped by the
insights and extraordinary promise of experimental science. But
alchemy’s decline would be gradual, and the epitaph for this ancient
tradition would never be fully written.
“The resilience of
the Hermetic arts in the face of new scientific knowledge is not
altogether surprising. For at least a century and a half after the
death of alchemy’s high priest, Paracelsus, his philosophy was one of
the dominant intellectual forces in Europe. Spurred on by Nicolaus
Copernicus’s 16th century explanation of the earth’s
planetary system, alchemists came to believe that they were uniquely
equipped to decipher a coherent understanding of nature.
HARMONIOUS INTERCONNECTEDNESS:
“In the grand view
they contrived, all of life was a harmonious system of correspondences
that linked the heavens to the planets, the planets to the earth, the
earth to seasonal changes, the seasons to human illness, and illness to
chemical medicines. It seemed entirely likely that in the long run
discoveries on earth would not only eliminate human suffering but would
also make plain the underlying wisdom of God’s higher laws. The
Paracelsians drew a broad analogy between the creation of the cosmos by
the Divine Power and the alchemist’s experiments in the laboratory: in
both cases, the magical agency of fire was called upon to separate the
pure from the impure, good from evil, light from darkness and order fro
m chaos. Within this philosophical framework, God was considered the
primordial chemist, the alchemist was his disciple and “great work” of
the adept was imbued with sacred significance.”(2) The alchemist’s task
was to sort out what bound together the cosmos by studying the universe
as a whole and working down to a more detailed understanding of
humankind, from macrocosm to microcosm. “By applying their beliefs and
practices at this level, the followers of Paracelsus hoped to begin by
finding cures for all illnesses and end by bringing about a spiritual
regeneration that would lead to a better world.”(2)
PHILOSOPHY VERSUS PRAGMATISM:
“With alchemists
seeking both mundane medical innovations and cosmic revelations, the
craft began to come apart at the seams and the inheritors of
Paracelsus’s legacy split into several camps. One group consisted of
purists who carried on a search for the spirit of life on the mystical
high ground of “chemical philosophy”. Others gravitated to more
pragmatic goals and focused mainly on experimentation in the
laboratory. And – just as in every previous era – there was the unusual
assortment of true believers and charlatans preoccupied strictly with
physical transmutation of base metals into rare ones and lusting after
nothing more than wealth and power.”(2)
The possibility of
chemical gold-making was not disproved by scientific evidence until the
late 1800’s. Sir Isaac Newton, 1643-1727, a rational scientist, thought
it worthwhile to experiment with it. The official attitude toward
alchemy in the 16th-18th centuries was
ambivalent. “By the end of the 18th century the foundations
of modern science were well established and skepticism toward the
alchemical arts was becoming pervasive among educated men and women.”(2)
The Art, as
alchemy was referred to, posed a threat to the control of a precious
metal and was often outlawed. On the other hand, there were advantages
to any ruler who could control gold making. Newton and his successors
along with the well-known 18th century French chemist,
Lavoisier, renounced what many at that time considered the most
important question of science – the relation of humans to the cosmos.
ALCHEMICAL INFLUENCES:
Many aspects of
alchemy are still with us today. A modern chemist who talks of a flask
being “hermetically” sealed is using the name of the father of alchemy,
Hermes Trismegistus (thrice-great Hermes), who was said to have
communicated the facts of life of the birth of metals by inscribing them
on a gigantic emerald slab. Metallurgists refer to “base metals, using
the same word for sinful which was applied through Christian mysticism
to those metals which were believed to be held back from being pure and
virtuous gold because of baseness in their nature. A person of
integrity may be referred to as “having a heart of gold” – a reference
to the belief of the alchemist’s that gold was pure in a mystical and
not ju st a metallurgical sense.
Alchemists,
animist, Gnostics, naturalists, shamans, Oriental philosophers, etc,.
have worked for millennia toward cures based on the life force and
primal energy of nature.
The basic belief
of alchemy was that there was a unity in all matter, and that the
various metals were built of the same actual stuff with different
arrangements and proportions of certain qualities. In case this seems
strange, it may be pointed out that modern science has very similar
theories, and that they are belief systems rather than matters of
experience or actual fact. Modern physics describes the atoms of the
various elements in terms of different arrangements of certain
electrical charges, and biologists try to find a unity between phenomena
of life and the world of the physicist by postulating that the
arrangement of atoms in protein molecules is the thing that counts.
Certain biologists are just as engrossed in the pursuit of trying to
arrange molecules in such a way that they will be alive as were the
alchemists in their obsession to separate out the base attributes of
lead or tin and convert them to the purity of gold. When scientists
talk about photography of the aura, fields of energy around plants and
crystals, and the geological intuitions of a dowser, it seems that
alchemy has more to offer than chemistry. This is not to say that
modern scientists are mistaken, but merely to emphasize that the
existence of a unifying principle has been the goal of alchemist and
scientist alike, and that this unifying principle itself is a matter of
belief, as philosophical postulate, a paradigm.
TRANSMUTATION:
Transmutation is
the key word characterizing alchemy and it may be understood in several
ways: in chemical changes, in physiological changes such as passing
from sickness to health and in a hoped-for transformation from old age
to youth, or even in passing from an earthly to a supernatural
existence. Alchemical changes seem always to have been positive, never
involving degradation except as an intermediate stage in a process
having a positive end. Alchemy aimed at wealth, longevity and
immortality.
References
-
Richard Grossinger, “Planet
Medicine: From Stone Age Shamanism to Post-Industrial Healing” Boulder: Shambhala, 1982
-
Editors of Time-Life Books, “Secrets
of the Alchemists” Alexandria: Time-Life Books, 1990.
-
Roger Pilkington, “Robert Boyle;
Father of Chemistry: London: John Murray, 1959.
-
Aaron John Ihde, “The development of
Modern Chemistry” New York; Harper & Row, 1964.
