Of the First Matter

Thales, Heraclitus, Hesiod, have regarded water as the First Matter of things. Moses appears, (Genesis, Chap. 1), to favor this idea by giving the names Abyss and Water to this First Matter not that he understood water as the element which we drink, but as a kind of smoke, a humid vapor, thick and dark, which is condensed, more or less, according to the greater or less density of the things which has pleased the Creator to form from it. This mist, this immense vapor, was condensed or rarefied into a universal chaotic Water, which thus became the principle of all for the present and for the future, (Cosmop. Tract 4). 

In its beginning this Water was volatile, as a mist condensation made of it a matter more or less fixed. But whatsoever may have been this Matter, the first principle of things, it was created in shadows too thick for the human mind to see clearly. Only the Author of Nature knows it, and in vain would theologians and philosophers wish to determine what it was yet, it is very probable that this dark abyss, this chaos, was an aqueous, or humid, matter, since it would be more easily rarefied and condensed, and consequently more suitable, because of these qualities, for the construction of the heaven and earth. 

18 The fundamental dogma of the Occult Sciences is resumes in the well-known aphorism Harmony results from the analogy of contraries. - E.B. 

This secret bond, uniting into a triunity all opposites, whether physical or metaphysical, constitutes the Grand Arcanum, the Universal Solvent of Alchymists. - E.B. 

In Hermetic Philosophy, the elements mean certain conditions in which bodies are found they are the equivalents of Solid, Liquid, Gaseous, etc. 

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When planning a compressor installation one of the first matters to be decided is whether there should be a central... 

Ali, S. Abdul-. Some notes on the doctrine of the first matter, with special reference to the works of Thomas Vaughan. JAlchem Soc 2, no. 10 (Feb 1914) 59-74. 

At first, the First Matter is perceived in states of profound meditation, what Vajrayana calls states of deep abiding. This advanced meditative state is called the black of near attainment in Tibetan texts, so confirming the alchemical texts in their injunction that the black of the First Matter has to be reached before attainment can be near. Upon reaching this stage, subjective consciousness fails. The Tibetan manuals call this swooning a contemporary term would be to faint. However,... 

But what of the nature of the First Matter itself Jung says The basis of the opus, the prima materia, is one of the most famous secrets of alchemy. This is hardly surprising since it represents the unknown substance that carries the projection of the autonomous psychic content. 7 It is, as we stated before, omnipresent and the root substance of all forms. Oriental texts term it Akasha the alchemical texts of the Occident give it many names. Taoism, the alchemical practice of China, has the primal intuition that the universe must have some unborn origin (prima materia). This is given verbal form in the Tao Teh Ching, XXV ... 

Kundalini is cosmic electricity, the universal life-principle, the conscious energy that takes form as all things and builds everything from within. The control of this energy in its subhuman forms, by mental means, is the primary secret of the Great Work. This cosmic electricity is called Chaiah in Qabalah and is attributed to Chokmah. It is the radiant Yod-force held within the medium of the First Matter, the womb of Binah. 

Figure 11. The Paths of Concealed Glory, the so-called Invisible Paths, are hidden from those who have not yet seen the Unity, revealed by the omnipresence of the First Matter.

As Water is of a nature closely approaching that of the First Matter of the World, it becomes easily its symbol, or image. The chaos, whence all was derived, was like a vapor, or a humid substance, similar to a subtle smoke. Light having rarefied it, the heavens were formed of the most subtilized portion the Air of that which was less so the elementary Water of that which was a little more terrestrial and the Earth, of the densest, and as feces, (Raymond Lully, Testam, Anc. Theor.). Therefore Water partaking of the nature of the Air and Earth, is placed in the middle. Lighter than the Earth and heavier than Air, it is always mixed with both. At the least rarefaction it seems to abandon the Earth to take the nature of the Air it is condensed by the least cold, it quits the Air, and unites itself with the Earth. 

ILECH CRUDUM — Crude Ilech, is a composition of the first matter of the three prime principles — Mercury, Salt and Sulphur — whereof all things are composed. 

I had gained that which I desired, being a knowledge of the First Matter, but not as yet of its initial preparation, a thing of all else most difficult in the world. In the end, however, I attained this also, after errors innumerable through the space of some... 

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