Cobalt evolution

 

Cobalt can have is of pink colour, also fuchsia purple/pink, some violet depending of the angle, and also a nice red as you can see on the picture.

In an old german alchemical book, (sorry I don't remember the title), Cobalt was associated to planet Mars.

If you have any experience about this metal, let me know :)

Of course, this pink colour could be realted to a more feminine energy like Jupiter or Venus. A deeper exploration of this metal will surely learn us more.

Green Opus

Salomon Trismosin, Splendor Solis.

After the painful passage in the kingdom of darkness, here we are, back to the surface of the earth, with a new life beginning. Spring ! see that the word/verb spring means a season, a foutain, or a new birth, something coming out of.

A personnal Work. We can see a chlorophylian green, even if it is not at all a plan work.

Sap is runnning to the top instead of staying under earth, in the core of the roots or seed, stagnant. There is an Ex-pression, because of this new pressure, new sun, new dew.

Salomon Trismosin, Splendor Solis.

This stage is linked with the Cauda Pavonis, or Peacock Tail, because of sometime, a multitude of colours coming in the surface of the bath, and also the deep colour green that can be seen, sometime, but only with some matters, we can have a peacock throat, of a very nice blue, but it is more linked to Nigredo.

A personnal Work. We witness an evolution in the green, from the very dark to the lighter.

This Opus of green colour is callen Viridis, in latin, and is the sign of the renewal of life into the matrix of the matter. This is joy coming and expressing itself, energy coming out ! A new breath, new projects are coming into mind, we feel happy and ready for planning future, wanting to create things, and to learn, express new things. After the darkness of low moods, this is a big change, and you feel it clearly. I also see that I listen far more music.

The Sulphur is coming out of hell, darkness.

The subject of the Cauda Pavonis, if we dig, can be very interesting, and even complex, as we can see, there is not only one Cauda Pavonis, we have the Black Cauda, see the image below :

Personnal Work, you can see on the wine, a kind of peacock tail, of course, it is not alchemical, only spagyrical and not related to the 'new life', it is something else. Here, we coud call that, "rooster tail".

We have the Alchemical Cauda (more complex than it seems to be, but, it is "under the rose"), and also a Mercurial Cauda Pavonis. In the last case, a rainbow colour is often seen in the glassware during a distillation for example. Another kind of Cauda Pavonis is also seen in the Mercurial Water while it is in elevation in the vessel, and when we apply to it by the side, a little light.

The CR+C : Resources in french about R+C

You can find some interesting resources in french about R+C here.

The CR+C seems to be a serious group, with a good background and filiation.

Suite sur Mme D'Urfée

Texte provenant des Mémoires des Souvenirs de la Marquise de Créquy.

Revenons, pour achever mon premier chapitre du Chevalier de Saint-Georges, sur un rare et curieux présent qu'il me fit remettre par le Maréchal d'Écosse, et qui consistait dans un Noble-à-la-Rose.

Ces pièces de monnaie, qui paraissent de facture gothique, sont précisément de la grandeur d'un double-louis, avec moitié moins d'épaisseur et de poids. Elles représentent un chevalier qui est armé de toutes pièces, et qui tient une rose à la main. Le revers en est chargé d'une croix fleuronnée ; et, quoi qu'en aient dit les dissertateurs et les antiquaires hollandais, qui se disputent depuis trois cents ans sur une chose qu'ils n'ont jamais vue, vous pouvez être assuré qu'il ne s'y trouve aucun millésime, ni aucune sorte d'inscription. Ces pièces ont parfaitement la couleur, le poids et la densité de l'or de ducat. Elles marquent sur la pierre de touche ainsi que l'or le plus pur et celui d'Ophyr, par exemple, et si vous les rompez, il en est pour la tranche absolument comme pour la superficie de la pièce. On a toujours dit que ces médailles étaient d'or philosophique, et quant à l'origine ou la date de ce produit du grand-oeuvre, dont les héritiers de la Rose de Lancastre ne sont pas restés en possession, ou a publié des choses tellement contradictoires, que je n'en parlerai point. Il est plus facile de s'abstenir que de se contenir, disait notre ami Fontenelle.

Toujours est-il que mon Noble-à-la-Rose avait donné dans l'oeil de Mme d'Urfé qui était la plus opiniâtre des alchimistes et la plus déterminée souffleuse de son temps. J'aurai l'occasion de vous reparler d'elle à propos du Comte de Saint-Germain, de Cagliostro et d'un misérable Chevalier Casanova, dont elle était l'adepte, et par conséquent la dupe. Je vous dirai préliminairement, sur Mme la marquise d'Urfé, qu'elle était fille du Marquis de Gontaut-Biron. Je crois me souvenir qu'elle appelait Reine-Claude, et ceci n'importe guère. Son mari, qu'elle avait épousé très-vieux, était le dernier descendant et le riche héritier du fameux Honoré, Marquis d'Urfé, à qui nous devons la composition de cet interminable roman de l'Astrée. Il avait d'abord épousé la belle et célèbre Diane de Château-Morand, qui était la femme de son frère aîné, et du vivant de celui-ci, lequel frère avait trouvé bon de planter là sa femme pour aller se faire ecclésiastique ; ce qui faisait dire au Pape Urbain VIII, qui n'entendait parler que des marquis d'Urfé pour des sollicitations de dispenses, qu'ils auraient eu besoin, pour eux deux tout seuls, d'une chancellerie pontificale et d'un Pape tout entier. Leur grand'mère était de la maison de Savoie, et ils avaient ajouté le nom impérial de Lascaris à celui de leur maison ; je n'ai jamais pu savoir en l'honneur de quel saint.

Mme d'Urfé, qui était notre parente, avait monté la tête à la Comtesse de Breteuil à l'effet d'obtenir de moi l'échange de ma pièce d'or philosophique contre un reliquaire admirablement garni de pierreries, ce qui se voyait parfaitement bien ; mais il était rempli, disait-elle, d'une précieuse collection des plus saintes reliques et des plus authentiques, ce dont je m'obstinais toujours à vouloir douter. Comme il était question de fondre ma pièce au creuset pour en indure la réalité du grand-oeuvre, je finis par me trouver en but à une persécution générale ; il n'y avait pas jusqu'à ma grand'mère qui ne voulût savoir à quoi s'en tenir sur la pierre philosophale. Je m'en fatiguai ; je lâchai prise, et voici le résultat de notre expérience, où vint présider M. van Nyvelt, le physicien.

En décomposant mon Noble-à-la-Rose, on y reconnut seulement une vingtième partie d'or, un quart de mercure, un scrupule de fer, un autre quart de cuivre, un huitième d'étain ; et, pour le surplus, un mélange de sels à base neutre, nous dit van Nyvelt, lesquels se cristallisèrent en prismes pentagones, à la grande satisfaction de la Marquise d'Urfé. — C'est une femme perdue, nous dit ma tante la Baronne ; elle en a la tête à l'envers, et tout son bien s'en ira par le soufflet. Voilà ce qui n'a pas manqué d'arriver, grâce à la munificence du Chevalier de Saint-Georges, et surtout grâce à l'avidité du Chevalier Casanova.

Giacomo Casanova and Marquise d'Urfée

The following text in from the 5th book of "Story of my Life" of Casanova, where he is in Paris.

After the dessert Tour d’Auvergne left us to go and see the Prince de Turenne, who was in a high fever, and after he was gone Madame d’Urfe began to discuss alchemy and magic, and all the other branches of her beloved science, or rather infatuation. When we got on to the magnum opus, and I asked her if she knew the nature of the first matter, it was only her politeness which prevented her from laughing; but controlling herself, she replied graciously that she already possessed the philosopher’s stone, and that she was acquainted with all the operations of the work. She then shewed me a collection of books which had belonged to the great d’Urfe, and Renee of Savoy, his wife; but she had added to it manuscripts which had cost her more than a hundred thousand francs. Paracelsus was her favourite author, and according to her he was neither man, woman, nor hermaphrodite, and had the misfortune to poison himself with an overdose of his panacea, or universal medicine. She shewed me a short manuscript in French, where the great work was clearly explained. She told me that she did not keep it under lock and key, because it was written in a cypher, the secret of which was known only to herself.

(...)

 

From the library we went into the laboratory, at which I was truly astonished. She shewed me matter that had been in the furnace for fifteen years, and was to be there for four or five years more. It was a powder of projection which was to transform instantaneously all metals into the finest gold. She shewed me a pipe by which the coal descended to the furnace, keeping it always at the same heat. The lumps of coal were impelled by their own weight at proper intervals and in equal quantities, so that she was often three months without looking at the furnace, the temperature remaining the same the whole time. The cinders were removed by another pipe, most ingeniously contrived, which also answered the purpose of a ventilator.

The calcination of mercury was mere child’s play to this wonderful woman. She shewed me the calcined matter, and said that whenever I liked she would instruct me as to the process. I next saw the Tree of Diana of the famous Taliamed, whose pupil she was. His real name was Maillot, and according to Madame d’Urfe he had not, as was supposed, died at Marseilles, but was still alive; “and,” added she, with a slight smile, “I often get letters from him. If the Regent of France,” said she, “had listened to me he would be alive now. He was my first friend; he gave me the name of Egeria, and he married me to M. d’Urfe”

She possessed a commentary on Raymond Lully, which cleared up all difficult points in the comments of Arnold de Villanova on the works of Roger Bacon and Geber, who, according to her, were still alive. This precious manuscript was in an ivory casket, the key of which she kept religiously; indeed her laboratory was a closed room to all but myself. I saw a small cask full of ‘platina del Pinto’, which she told me she could transmute into gold when she pleased. It had been given her by M. Vood himself in 1743. She shewed me the same metal in four phials. In the first three the platinum remained intact in sulphuric, nitric, and muriatic acid, but in the fourth, which contained ‘aqua regia’, the metal had not been able to resist the action of the acid. She melted it with the burning-glass, and said it could be melted in no other way, which proved, in her opinion, its superiority to gold. She shewed me some precipitated by sal ammoniac, which would not precipitate gold.

Her athanor had been alight for fifteen years. The top was full of black coal, which made me conclude that she had been in the laboratory two or three days before. Stopping before the Tree of Diana, I asked her, in a respectful voice, if she agreed with those who said it was only fit to amuse children. She replied, in a dignified manner, that she had made it to divert herself with the crystallization of the silver, spirit of nitre, and mercury, and that she looked upon it as a piece of metallic vegetation, representing in little what nature performed on a larger scale; but she added, very seriously, that she could make a Tree of Diana which should be a very Tree of the Sun, which would produce golden fruit, which might be gathered, and which would continue to be produced till no more remained of a certain ingredient. I said modestly that I could not believe the thing possible without the powder of projection, but her only answer was a pleased smile.

She then pointed out a china basin containing nitre, mercury, and sulphur, and a fixed salt on a plate. (etc etc) the folowing part here.

Fortunately, Giacomo Casanova, had the good fortune to enter her Laboratory, and he also had the marvellous idea to put on the paper his stories and adventures, otherwise, nothing would have remain of this historical encounter between these two people.

Where is now this ciphered book that described in full the Great Work ? Where is this marvellous athanor burning at equal temperature ? Lost maybe, or in a private collection for the book ?

Taliamed was in fact Benoît de Maillet, (1656 and dead or not dead, in 1738 in Marseille; consul of France in Egypt, and inspector of the French Establishments au Levant, author of a theory about Earth evolution).

1735 Benoit de Maillet.

If B. de Maillet, was the teacher of Marquise D'Urfée, then he was himself a very good Alchemist and Hermetist. Which can be proved by the dedication his books and the "To the illustrious Cyrano De Bergerac" in the first volume of his Telliamed.

Vol I

Vol II

"Plata del Pinto", is in fact platina, which was discovered in Jamaïca, in Rio Pinto.

This is here an archemical operation, leading to transmute this platina, very near in quality to gold, to its maturity, i;e gold.

She smiles at Casanova, concerning his answer about the Tree of the Sun because of course, the powder of projection is of no use in this process... here Casanova is maybe a little too much confident :) And Mme D'Urfée is very polite.

And what she said about the "certain ingredient" is true, and is quite easy to understand if you compare the process to the vegetal one.

Lunar Tree, Diana Tree.

Chemistry and Alchemical understanding of the Matter

From the scientific point of view, old Alchemists considered matter in a very strange way, even when complex, it was seen as "one" in the beginning, not by the chemical compounds of course, but by its inner "nature" or "quality". An example :

          Iron sulphate, was considered as Green Vitrol. The nowadays chemist will call it by it's scientific name, "Iron Sulphate", and create thus a chemical duality, Iron + Sulfate. The Alchemist do not consider this matter like a duality. It is for them, "Green Vitriol". Not a sulphate, but a "Salt" nature, like Niter or Tartar, or Sea Salt, Alum ... and the quality of this salt was more important than what was in it. We know for example that Niter is fiery and also full of "air", sea salt is not at all like that, it is neutral, and cannot be entirely sublimated (apart it's acidic spirit when in dry distillation) like sal ammoniac for example, full of air too !

"Iron oxide" or "Crocus Martis". A Red Sulphur.

Of course, they did "chemical" things, like mercurial sublimate (corrosive sublimate) by putting muriatic acid (okay ... HCl :) ) and Hydragyrum or "Hg"/Quicksilver, and after by distillating it, but it was not by chemical knowledge, but more by an hermetical understanding. But a chemical thing say nothing about the hermetical nature of this matter. Mercury is a volatile metal, full of fire and air (of fire because it is liquid, and air because it is easely volatilized), add it an acidic nature that gives it a power over metals (fire in a water or a mercury), and "tadam !" you have a kind of "milk", having the power of both elements, Hg and HCl, isn't that beautiful ? Two mercuries together give birth to a more complete mercury ... nice. But this Mercury is seen as ONE thing, not a compound of the two chemical elements.

Four elements into one. The elemental vision is purely an hermetical one.

Maybe you don't know that in alchemy, Red + White = Black,a nd Black + Fire and Secret Fire = green, white, yellow, and red :)

Also know that Sulfur plus Mercury plus Salt = One Stone. So, 1 + 1 + 1 = 1

And one give 3 or 4. And these number, not changing in quantity, can change in quality !

Vitriol of Mars Red Oil by distillation

(from Patrick Rivière's website).

And even if they understood that these three principles (sulfur, mercury, and salt) where united into one part, making for example one "dragon" or one "lion", they still could use their vision of "triality", in this unitary use of the matter.

We change our point of view when we need it. And a little like a quantum physic, we use matter as we want, considering what we want to do.

Homunculus and other kind of living creation.

From a latin word : Homunculus, meaning "little man". It was a work done in the goal to create out one or several kind of matters a little living man, or woman, and sometime both, in a miniature world, or microcosm, alike a fish in an aquarium.

Here the Faust's Homunculus, engraving of the XIXth century.
Quite a caricatural and absolutely non accurate description of the process...

Some old methods give the entire process, saying that a couple, an Adam and a Eve, live in a vessel, where grow a tree in the center. Homunculi should grow, and be fed until they dies.They eat the manna that give the Alchemist (this manna comes from the process of their creation), when there is no manna at all to give, they eat the fruits of the central tree, and then, die, but they can live, 6 years ( !!).  The matters used are really important, if the matters are of bad things, bad persons, or bads quality, the Homunculus will be ugly and of bad nature, of course, if the matters are of good persons, the Homunculus is beautiful and good for the Alchemist. An Homunculus can provide a shel for an adombrement (incarnation of a spiritual soul) of high level. An Homunculus is a production by animal archemy. Of course, other kind of living creatures can born in the hands of the Alchemists, in the different kingdoms. In this case, High entities are linked to this production and have a support for manifesting and communicating with the Alchemist, if he can communicate with, he can learn a lot from. I think particularly of the growing metallic trees, provinding gold and silver apples, after having bloom... like a living plant. Of course, in order to create such a thing, you have to understand the process of creation and of life in these kingdoms, not only from a "biological side" but from an hermetical side of course.

G.Aurach : The Donum Dei.

Of course, we can consider that the Philosopher Stone is a kind of Homunculus, of a female nature, when in the White Stone, and male, in the Red. And the process of creation of the Homunculus is in fact the Great Work process, described in another way.

Note that the Homunculus is not a magical creature, no ritual or life insufflation by a theurgical or thaumaturgical way. It is different from a Golem. A Golem is a very high level of Theurgical Creation in the Kaballistic Tradition. The priest able to made it was most part of the time considered as a Holy man. The ritual can only be performed by a very advanced Magus, because of the complexity of the operation and also the forces involved.

Creation of the Golem.

The Golem is made out of wood, clay, etc, and act more on an astral manner like a spiritus familiaris, or an elemental. Note that the Yidam creation practice in Buddhist tradition is also very interesting.

These five kind of creatures made by an Hermetical Artist, are all different. Homunculus, Golem, Spiritus Familiaris, Yidam and Elemental have not the same purpose or function. Note that the last three can have a body, but it is optional. But they need a place to rest, the Yidam, a Deity, has its Yantra, a sand work, designed as a mandala, in order to give a palace for the Deity, in order for it to come into manifestation, in fact, this is nothing else than a kind of "triangle of evocation" like the one used in magik. The purpose of the Yidam is the Enlightement of the Monk, understanding that all the creation is purely a "mental" thing, imaginary creation. Nothing is real since the moment you can bring something into your world out of nowhere and nothing !

The Spiritus Familiaris and Elemental are made of different manner, ritualistic, non ritualistic, and energies (planetary, elemental, several elements, or all elements together etc), but the purpose is quite the same. They serve to different goals in order to make the Magus' life easier and to accomplish certain important tasks for him.