i LECTURE NOTES : by MANLY P. HALL l | | = i n , LECTURE #322 \ | [ I : \ ESOTERIC ALCHEMY The Transmutation of Attitudes Copyright © 1986 THE PHILOSOPHICAL RESEARCH SOCIETY, INC. . 3910 Los Feliz Blyd., Los Angeles, CA 90027vee AD ANT A FVGIENS, hoc el, #EMBLEMATA NOVA 7 DE SECRETIS NATURA S CHYMICA, ‘Accommodata partim oculis S&intelleétui, figuris cupro intciis, adjeetisque fententiis, Epigram- 9 matis 6 notis partim autibus & recteationi animi plas minus co Fugis Muficalibus wium Voc, quant dux adanan impicem mel diam diffichis canendis petapcam , co.relpo: deant, nou abfqs fingnlarijucunditare vidend legenda,meditanda,,intelligendaydyjudicandy, canenda & audienda: Authors Mictarie Mayero Imperial, Con- fitorii Comite; Med.D. Bq. ex. &c. OP PENHEIMIT Extypographia Hrexo nvr Garcery Sumpribia Tou. Troporide BRY¥ “MDC xvTinESOTERIC ALCHEMY ‘The Transmutation of Attitudes It was once pointed out by Raymond Lully, one of the great early alchemists, that the tragedy cf the concept of alcheny was the transmita- tion of motals, Basil Valontine, Monk of St. Bonnett, oxprossed the cane thought in his book: WOE 10 THE GOLD MAKERS. The history of alcheny divides into two distinct branches that have descended fron antiquity, possibly originating in Egypt. The word "Chon" in both chemistry and alchemy is an ancient nare for Egypt. "Al" is divine or sacred and we find it used in the Bible in such terms as "Alevin." Of course the Deity of Islam 1s Allah, The divine prefix would imlicate that alchemy is a spiritual art, a divine secret science. The great texts of alcheny have come principally fron the hermetic vackground at the beginning of the Christian era and probably there were alchemical schools in Alexandria at that tine, There are also early yecords of alchemy in Ghina and in India, It seoms that from very far back there has descended a double concept of chemistry: physical chemistry having to do with those areas of knowledge which are now considered scientific, ami spiritual chemistry which was definitely a sacred art, In practice, the difference in these tro systens was summarized rather well by Paracelsus when he pointed out that the alchemical trans- mutation was impossible unless the alchemist himself was in the process of transformation, Today chemistry is largely dominated by the profit concept, the idee of wealth. All kins of chemical experinents are being made for various reasons, some of thea very good, sone of then very dangerous, but always with a certain concept of return in naterial wealth for the good or the evil that is done, Chemistry is largely a material art, dominated by scientific inquiry and not in any Way involving any necessary spiritual overtones. The chemist does not have to be a person of great faith, does not have to believe in meta- physical or mystical procedures, He is simply working with physical tests and physical texta, The alchemist, on the other hand, has an entirely different perspective. Most of the alchemists were pious people, convinced that their advancenent of science was a spiritual contribution to the well being of eoctety and concerned with the development of their own inner lives. Jakob Boehme used 2 number of alchemical terns in his mystical writings and these have been confusing to modern students of his work. Actually the use given by Boshne in most cases probably is the original intended usage, namely, that alchemy is a great system of human regen- eration, having nothing whatsoever to do with the advancement of worldly goods or worldly position, In Europe the alchenists were persecuted and in many cases put to ‘the rack and tortured to death, because the rulers or avaricious leaders wanted the secrot of gold making, Tne monent the alchemist began to publicize this part of his belief, he immediately opened himself to persecution, so that the gold making as a science brought many of the alchemists to destruction, Also, the manufacture of gold or any other precious substance without control by the state could result in the tankruptey of the world,The question then remains: can gold actually be manufactured? Not whether it should be or not, tut can it be? I think the answer has to be in the affirmative, It can be. It also is obvious from recent experimen- tation that the subject could be advanced, But this is not the real purpose of alchemy ani where the chemists get together to raice their own level of economic living, the sclentists run into a very desperate prostitution, The ancient alchenists vere using symbols at a very early date, In nany cases the symbols were accepted as literal pictures, but this has led to further confusion. We know, for instance, that in ancient alcheny the great retort in which all the experinents were being made was a syabol for the solar system itself, viewed as a glove within which all the chomis- tries and alchenies of existence were taking place, The anclents believed that this world in which we live is a great theatre of mysteries, the secrets of which have never been solved. Actually, the world is strangely complete within itcelf, containing everything necessary for the infinite perpetuation of itself, This condition remsins rather peaceful and natural until hunan ambition and avarice take over, The ambition of the average modern person is involving fane, distinction, or wealth. There- fore, he innediately is using knowledge for the formation directly or indirectly of gold. He may not make the gold in the retort but he will sell secrets or scientific formilas which will bring him rich financial rewards. We right ask: what harm is this? One of the reasons it is oxtronely dangerous is because the monent we tegin to experinent with the basic laws of existence we are very apt to forget their own integrities. Natural Jaws have to be obeyed and ve are not interested in obeying natural laws but in changing then to fit our convenlences. We want to use natural law to exploit the universe in which we live and as @ result we are constantly in trouble and in the same dilenms that wuriened the alchemist, Many years ago there was an anateur alchonist here in Los Angeles. He was a delightful old German gentlonan ani for a prosaic living he worked in a cheese factory, but he was experimenting on the side through- out most of his life, trying to work out some strange and mysterious formilas that had descended to hin fron the past. Before passing on some years ago, he donated most of his alchenical books to our library. He was certain there was an answer but that he had not been able to live long enough to find it. ‘Ancther acquaintance engaged in alchemical speculation followed every rule in the book he could find, and of course soon found that every book had a different set of rules. This was confusing and frustrating to him, He bought a lot of apparatus and instruments, followed hunches ard hints, and was always on the verge of a great @iscovery that never happened, What he did not have was a deep, abiding Jove of Goi, faith, or mankind. He was simply an intellectual, convinced ‘that a eclence could be made to work, What the sclence meant in terms of his own character never seened to occur to him. In the alchemy of Chins and India the symbolism noves from chemistry to all kimis of vibratory patterns. In China alchemy was tied in with music and the misical scale--the harmonics of life, The ancient Greeks of the Pythagorean period combined all their knowledge of cosmogony and. the actual reformation of man into a great mathenatical formila which was never to be taken literally but was to becone almost like a mantra, a Besacred statenent which, 1f obeyed, could produce tremendous results, Hermetic philosophy also becane involved in alcheny. The hernet- ieists of Alexaniria followed a mysterious being known to them as Hernes Trismegistus, or Hermes the Thrice Great. Who he as, when he lived, no one seens to know. Whether he was a production of cynbolien or perhaps a great alchenical adept of sone ancient time, we do not knox, but in herneticion we begin to sense the beginning of the transmutation of man as the essential purpose of the great alchemical procedure, In Europe, in addition to their other problens, it was necessary for tho alchomists to be careful in the promulgation of sone of these eliefs because of the bitter opposition of the clergy. The clerey sensed the fact that in cone way alcheny was a religion ani they were ‘therefore quite sure it hai to be included among the heresies, As a result, however, of the motion of Arabic knowledge into Europo, the alchemical secrets passed into the keeping of persons like Paracelsus, Khurrath, and Valentine, ani these persons gained their knowledge of ‘the alchemical processes largely from Constantinople and Baghdad, This, of course, meant still more that the knowleige had to be held in secrecy against the persecutions ani martyrdons that were popular in Europe at that time, In many parte of the world alchemy was recognised for what it actually wast a series of symbols intended to convey a major operation concerning the transmutation of man himself. Without this transmutation, none of the great good things we dream of can come about, The elixir of life or philosopher's stone vas toat. power by neans of which alll good things could come to pass, wherein all errors and forms of ignorance could be overcome amd the individual could gain complete control of not only his own life tut the laws governing it. Therefore, we come to the particular question that seems to be very much in the medieval elchenical tradition--that 1s, is there any proof of transmutation? Is there any actual evidence of things being completely altered? Has there ever been a scientist that could completely alter any- thing? He could modify it, improve it to a degree, and could destroy it always, But the process of actual trensfornation of a thing from what it 4s to something totally different--this has teen a question of concern An alchemical researches for ages. The evidence for transautation 1s extraordinarily simple: the answer lies in the human body itself. The process of digestion of food requires the transformation of elements. It requires an alnost instantaneous adaptation of certain principles to special usages for which they were not originally intended. It 4s possible, therefore, for food which is taken in to in sone way maintain a life principle which is not a food and not in the body otherwise, but is used to nourish the life or principle in the hunan being. The bread, butter, vegetables, fruit, milk ani other foods keep alive something that is not any of them, which throughout lize Will continue to canse the heart to beat, to circulate the ‘loi, to nourish the functions of the human being until the end of life. ‘Out of what goes into him comes out of him arts, sclences, poetry, misic, phil- osophy, religion, and economics--they all come out of someone who is nourished by the food, the atmosphere around him, water, the rays of the planets, and the light of the sun and moon, The synbolism of the wed- ding of the sun and moon in alchemy is very important--not because there 3.will be a wedding in the sky of the two luninaries, but because of the union of the principles for which they stand inside of the Human body. Thus there ic the amazing ovidence of the one life flowing behind all forns and nade available through nutrition to every creature. From the harvests in the fields a world is nourished, ami those who absorb these harvests become proficient in many forns of activity. In the Christian doctrine of the Eucharist, the divine blood parallels 4n alchony the elixiz of life, How this divine blood operates is not clear to many people, but in sone mysterious way univorsal life supports the life of people, people who may nover be aware of the source of their own nutri- tion and in a mechanistic era such as ours do not care about the source of their nutrition, Out of this has cone a new concept of nutrition, a concept involving vitamins, proteins, carbohydrates--an ontire systex of nutrition based upon the developnent of highly specialized nutrients fron the yarious food materials we eat. All these rutrients have something to do with the maintenance of the various structures of the human body. In this sense there is an acceptance of alcheny without any understaniing of it. Here there is the realization that nutrition does do the work, but how and why it does it ani how one general type of nutrition can maintein an infinite diversity of creatures is another situation that is difficult to understand, ‘The nutrition must be conditioned to the creature which is receiving the nourishnent, So we have within our own bodies an extraordinary labo- ratory, a laboratory the mysteries of which we have not begun to touch. Someone can prescribe various materials for our common nutrition ani for special emergencies thet arise, but prescribing them is not creating then, and prescribing thom is not understanding then. We heve simply cone to know that certain matorials have certain effects and we depend upon then to maintain the procedures which we hope will strengthen and lengthen our life expectancies. Inmortal lige is one of the belicfs of alchemy and there are a number of very quaint and urusual concepts about this matter. Sone of these con- cepts are difficult to understand even now, but we know that they definitely believed that there were in the world 2 few individuals who had solved the nystery of alchemy. The master of all the alchenists was Blias Artista, the most celebrated of all the heractic adepts and philosophers. No one really knew him, although we do have two or three early books in the library in which alchenists described 2 meeting with him, The symbol of the perfect alchenict, Elias Artista had a number of disciples who came very close to hin in achieving the enis which he cought, Hic powers wore such that he would appear in laboratories where worthy persons had worked very hard for years and give then a hint or a little advice to advance their researches, only to disappear and to never be seen by then again, He appeared in many nations in nany different guises and spoke many Janguages, He is supposedly an eternal person, living on and on because there was nothing in him that could cause hia to die; death has to be the rosult of causes. Life expectancies are increasing constantly, but life expectancies to reach a phenomenal extension of tine are now either a phenonena in thenselves, the result of very serious scientific condition- ing, or constitutional ability to adapt nutrition over a longer period of ‘imo than is possible for most people. 4,The alchemists pointed out that the beginning of the alchenical experinent was to renove all friction from life, 3y friction 1s neant wear and tear, Now what 1s wear ami tear? To most people it neans doing the things they have to do ami have no particular interest in doing. Wear ani tear is also the result of the lack of control of the nental, emotional and physical activities of the individual, All of these activities use energy. A large part of the energy we use we waste. We are not conserving it, not teking care of this mysterious vitality that cones to us, We are allowing it to be expended in all kinds of use- Jess ways. Of course we have to make physical edjustment for employment, ‘but it is not the work necessarily that is the greatest cause of problems; itis the attitude toxand the work, It is tho lack of ontmusiasm, the lack of recognition of significance of the things that we do thatdepress us. Emotional relationships out of hand can become a terrible eneny to vitality, Worry, fear, anxlety--all of these use up part of this alchemical nutrition that is constantly being made within ourselves. If we waste it wo can no longer have it. If we use it umisely it is dis- sipated, And to maintain artificial attitudes «ill gradually undermine ‘the necessary functions of the body. The alchemist first of all declare’ that the master of all arts was God. Deity was in a sense the extra versonal perfect alchemist because in Deity all things continue according to the Divine Will. How this Will operates, man does not know, but he does recognize, if he 1s mystically inclined, that there is « tremendous background of eternal wisdom behind the happenings in nature, Deity becomes the perfect force behini genera- tion and regeneration, Deity brings forth the eeel, the plant, the flower ani the fruit. Ani then that seed becomes the next generation of the same, Alchemical symbolism is strange ani obscure but well worth trying to understand, We mist begin with what the alchemist begins with: bese metals, We must begin with things as they are here, We cannot build our alchemical formilas from elenents or substances not availatle to us. The Yeginning is to recognize that the first operation is o tranomitation of physical factors, elements, and properties; in other words, purification, If it 4s mercury, 1t must be purified, If 1t 1s sulphur, it must be purified. If itis salt, it aust be purified. And if it 1c man, he mst be purified. Everything begins with the purification or renoval of the dross which limits the value and survival of elements, principles, and substances. The alchemist starts with the concept of a pure material with which to work, He is given various clues and keys on how to achieve this pure material, He might assemble it under certain aspects of planets or wait until the moon shines upon the water before he uses it in his test tubes. He may do all kinds of things, First he mst purify by gathering hic materials from pure sources as much as he can, Most of the great exper- iments of Paracelsus and many others were possible because of the pure high atmosphere of the Alps where materials were uncontaminated and grow to the fullness of thenselves. In their day there was no smog or congestion, These puro materials, having been found, vecame the basic elements in which they Worked. ‘The sane problem applies to the individual. The alchemist must first purify his own body and bis own nature, Until the body is cleansed, its various processes cannot be refined, While all the Antegration and organization of his abilities ani capacities, the Seimprovenent of his nature through learning, meditation and contemplation ll load up to, contribute to, and make possible a final internal 411umi- nation, the final secret has to cone from inside. Therefore, everything has to be refined until the soul of itself is available, and in man it is his ov soul; until this is available, he labors in vain, Those efforts that have to contribute to this progress must be considered as disciplines or as first steps tovari achievement, They represent, first of all man's recognition of his responsibility to the life principle which exists in him and in which he exists. This principle is divine, sacred, and the most valuable and mysterious thing in the whole world. Unless the individual 1s true to this basic principle in his own life and way of living and thinking, he cannot hope to advance in the cause of spiritual alchemy, For achievement he mist do everything possible to nake his own life reasonable and normal, This does not mean that he has to depart fron society or go into some refuge noar tho top of the Alps, ‘but there must be an establishment of ‘asic harnony within himself. Harmony is the rroof of the compatibility of the elements, Harmony 1s the ability o? different chemical elements to work together, only possible when they are purified--in their gross forn they Will never be compatible. Salt and sulphur in the forn of the physical elenents available for purchase can never be compatible, It is necessary to cleanse them both, refine then, ard remove from then those elenents which are the cause of conflict, It 1s not the essence of the sulphur or salt that is the problen; it is the crystallisation around then which cones into conflict with other sinilar orystallizations, Tho alchemist mst put his own house in onder; he is actually searching for sonething that is in its substance and essence completely sacred. There- fore, any other consideration is going to danage his probabilities of getting it. The alchemical procedure most commonly known is related to one of ‘wo distinct enis: one the creation of the philosopher's stone; the other the brewing of the philosophical modicine--the elixir of life, ‘The stone in itself represents the body of wisdom purified; the universal medicine represents the soul, ‘he medicine of immortality must be derived from things that have a birth and death of themselves, In other words, the nutrition that is given off may cause the prinitive elenent to be lost, tut its power goes on, It does not die; it simply reincarnates on a higher level, When we take into ourselves basic elements they are reborn in us ani therefore pass through a process of evolution as they are used by the human being to maintain the economy of life. ‘The alchemist must first find a quiet place to work; he must have his Little latoratory. To the ancient alchemists the laboratory was a furnace, a fixeplace with sone bottles and a few old books to guide his way. The neaning of the laboratory for us 1s actually a tody free fron interference and confusion that ve can retire into waen we so will, In other words, the laboratory is our ovn internal, that part of ourselves which is alvays ca- pable of being reduced to a harmonious situation, The personal life must be basically harmonious. Nany people feel that this is not possible, that there is no answer to all these grievances and griefs that beset us and affect us, But the alchemist says you are after the most valuable thing in the world and if you are hoping to got it you must carn it by miking ad juat- nents that will never be required of anyone except for this purpose, 6