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celestial Water, but the secret consists in the knowing how to make the Stone become Magnet, to attract, embrace,
and unite this Astral Quintessence to it self, so as to make together one sole Essence, perfect and more than perfect,
able to give Perfection to the imperfect, after the Accomplishment of the Magistery.PYROPHILUS
How many and great are Obligations to you, that you are pleased to reveal to me so great Mysteries, to whose
Knowledge I could never hope to attain, without the Assistance of your Elucidations! But since you are pleased to
indulge my continuance, permit me, if you please, to tell you, that I never saw any Philosopher until now, who so
precisely declares as this does, that there must be a Wife given to the Stone, making it to that end speak in this
manner. {30}. If these artists had carried their Enquiry further, and had examined which is the Wife who is proper
for me; if they had sought her out, and had united me to her, I had been able to have tinged a thousand times more.
Although I am sensible in general, that this Passage has an entire Relation to the former, yet, I must confess, that this
Expression of a Wise, proper for the Stone, does notwithstanding perplex me.
EUDOXUS
It is very much, however, that you know already of your self, that this Passage has a Connexion with that which I
just before explained to you, i.e. that you well apprehend, that the Wife which is proper for the Stone, and which
ought to be united to it, is that Fountain of living Water, whose Source altogether Celestial, which hath particularly
its Center in the Sun, and in the Moon, produces that clear and precious Stream or Rivulet of the wise Men, which
gently slides into the Sea of the Philosophers, which environs all the World; it is not without very good Reason, that
this Divine Fountain is called by the Author, the Wife of the Stone; some have represented it under the Form of a
heavenly nymph; some give it the Name of the chaste Diana, whose Purity and Virginity is not defiled by the
spiritual Band that unites it to the Stone: In a word, this magnetick Connexion is the magical marriage of Heaven
and Earth, whereof some Philosophers have spoken; so that the fruitful Source of the physical Tincture, that
performs so great Wonders, takes Birth from this altogether mysterious conjugal Union.
PYROPHILUS
I find with an unspeakable Satisfaction the whole Effect of the Elucidations, you have been pleased to impart to me;
and since we are upon this Point, I desire you leave to ask you a Question, which though it rise not from the Text of
this Author, is yet essential to this Subject. I beseech you to tell me, whether the magical Marriage of Heaven and
Earth can be celebrated at any time? Or whether there be Seasons of the Year more proper than others to solemnize
those magical Nuptials.
EUDOXUS
I am already gone too far, to refuse you an Explication so necessary, and so reasonable. Divers Philosophers have
told the Season of the Year, which is the most proper for this Operation. Some have made no Mystery of it; others
more reserved have not explained themselves upon this Point, but in Parables. The first have named the Month of
March, and the Spring. Zachary, and other Philosophers say, that they begun the Work at Easter, and that they
finished it happily within the Course of the Year. Others are contended with representing the Garden of Hesperides
enamelled with Flowers, and particularly with Violets and Primroses, which are the earliest Productions of the
Spring. Cosmopolite more ingenious than the rest to indicate, that the Season the most proper for the philosophick
Work, is that wherein all living Beings, sensitives and vegetables, appear animated with a new Fire, which carries
them reciprocally to Love, and to the Multiplication of their Kinds; he says, that Venus is the Goddess of this
charming Isle, wherein he saw naked all the Mysteries of Nature; but to denote more precisely this Season, he says,
That there were seen seeding in the Pasture, Rams and Bulls, with two young Shepherds, expressing clearly in this
witty Allegory, the three spring Months, by the three celestial Signs, answering to them, viz. Aries, Taurus and
Gemini.
PYROPHILUS
I am ravished with the Interpretations. Those who are greater Proficients in these Mysteries than I am, perhaps may
not put so great a Value as I do on the Solution of the Enigma's, whose Sense has notwithstanding been hitherto
impenetrable to many of those, who in other Respects are supposed to have very well understood the Philosophers. I
am persuaded that one ought very much esteem such an Instruction, it being capable to make one see clear into other
more important Obscurities; indeed few would imagine, that the Violets and Hyacinths of Espagnet, and the horned
Beast of the Garden of Hesperides; and the House of the Ram of Cosmopolite, and Philalethe; the Isle of the
Goddess Venus, the two Shepherds, and the rest that you but now explained, should signify the Season of the Spring.
I am not the only Person who ought to give you a thousand Thanks, that you have been pleased to unfold these
Mysteries; I am assured, that in Process of Time, there will be found a greater Number of the Sons of Science, who
will bless your Memory for having opened their Eyes upon a Point more essential to this grand Art, than they would
otherwise have been inclined to imagine.
EUDOXUS
You have Reason in that, one cannot be assured that one understands the Philosophers, without having an entire
understanding of the least Things that they have written. The Knowledge of the Season proper to begin the Work, is
of no little consequence; the fundamental Reason thereof is this. Whereas, the Sage undertakes to perform by our
Art, a Thing which is above the ordinary Force of Nature, as to soften a Stone, and to cause a metallick Germ to
vegetate; he finds himself indispensably obliged to enter by a profound Mediation into the most secret Recesses of [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]