Esoteric alchemists

The operations even of the esoteric alchemists were subject to wide variations but the central and crucial feature of the Great Work consisted in a prolonged and controlled heating of the proximate materials, under the right conditions, in the scaled vessel of Hermes. Thereafter it was often supposed that (he potency of the Stone could be greatly enhanced in the process called multiplication. Finally, the multiplied Stone was added to the fused base metal in the crowning operation of projection, thereby bringing about a rapid and spectacular transmutation. Finis coronal opus ... 

A black market developed for the yellow element to make black powder. Until then, sulfur had been only a curiosity to the esoteric alchemists. The Church set out to limit the spread of the WMD by keeping sulfur and the other gunpowder ingredients out of the hands of the infidels. In 1527, Pope Clement VII (1478 -1534) issued a papal bull excommunicating those who traded sulfur to Saracens, Turks and other enemies of the Christian name. Similar decrees were issued by Pope Paul III (1468 - 1549) and Pope Urban VIII (1568 - 1644). These Papal documents are the earliest, but not the last, examples of cartel control over the international trade of sulfur. 

Coming." At this time eschatological discourse was co-opted into the service of the esoteric sciences, most especially into alchemical theory in the twelfth century Latin translation of the Turba philosophorum (Arabic original ca. 900 AD). Christian interpolations were added to this text referring to the death and resurrection of the chemicals in apocalyptic terms." The process of distillation in Christian alchemy symbolised death and resurrection, as well as the union of Macrocosm and Microcosm. To the alchemists the death and resurrection of the stone in the manner of a human being was the clearest indication that alchemy was a divine, not a human science. 

Baker, Douglas M. The diary of an alchemist. Potters Bar College of Spiritual Enlightenment and Esoteric Knowledge, 1977. 103, 44p. 

The Great Work of the Alchemists. A Fantastic Journey Through the History of Esoteric Lore. 

Our hermetic scholar-writer next gives us an idea of the modem Alchemist s curriculum, usefully providing for us the standard esoteric reading list of the day (which, in part, resembles the conjectured bibliography of Duchamp, also known for his placid consumption of tobacco) ... 

Once plausibly unmasked as the Alchemist of the Avant-Garde, we may now in turn proceed to reveal the essentially esoteric underpinnings of Duchamp s much discussed, truly artful manipulations of Ghance and the Fourth Dimension. 

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