But, of course, this seed of gold is most easily obtainable from well-matured gold itself.... Remember that I am now speaking of metallic seed, and not of Mercury.... The seed of metals is hidden out of sight still more completely than that of animals;nevertheless, it is within the compass of our Art to extract it.
The seed of animals and vegetables is something separate, and may be cut out, or otherwise separately exhibited; but metallic seed is diffused throughout the metal, and contained in all its smallest parts; neither can it be discerned from its body:
its extraction is therefore a task which may well tax the ingenuity of the most experienced philosopher; the virtues of the whole metal have to be intensified, so as to convert it into the sperm of our seed, which, by circulation, receives the virtues of superiors and inferiors, then next becomes wholly form, or heavenly virtue, which can communicate this to others related to it by homogeneity of matter. . . . The place in which the seed resides is--approximately speaking--water; for, to speak properly and exactly, the seed is the smallest part of the metal, and is invisible;but as this invisible presence is diffused throughout the water of its kind, and exerts its virtue therein, nothing being visible to the eye but water, we are left to conclude from rational induction that this inward agent (which is, properly speaking, the seed) is really there.
Hence we call the whole of the water seed, just as we call the whole of the grain seed, though the germ of life is only a smallest particle of the grain."[1b]
[1] _The Answer of_ BERNARDUS TREVISANUS, _etc_. _Op. cit_. p. 218.
[2] _op. cit_., p. 22.
[3] _Ibid_., p. 16.
[1b] EIRENAEUS PHILALETHES: _The Metamorphosis of Metals_.
(See _The Hermetic Museum_, vol. ii. pp. 238-240.)To say that "PHILALETHES' " seed resembles the modern electron is, perhaps, to draw a rather fanciful analogy, since the electron is a very precise idea, the result of the mathematical interpretation of the results of exact experimentation. But though it would be absurd to speak of this concept of the one seed of all metals as an anticipation of the electron, to apply the expression "metallic seed"to the electron, now that the concept of it has been reached, does not seem so absurd.
According to "PHILALETHES," the extraction of the seed is a very difficult process, accomplishable, however, by the aid of mercury--the water homogeneous therewith.
Mercury, again, is the form of the seed thereby obtained.
He writes: "When the sperm hidden in the body of gold is brought out by means of our Art, it appears under the form of Mercury, whence it is exalted into the quintessence which is first white, and then, by means of continuous coction, becomes red." And again:
"There is a womb into which the gold (if placed therein)will, of its own accord, emit its seed, until it is debilitated and dies, and by its death is renewed into a most glorious King, who thenceforward receives power to deliver all his brethren from the fear of death."[1]
[1] EIRENAEUS PHILALETHES: _The Metamorphosis of Metals_.
(See _The Hermetic Museum_, vol. ii. pp. 241 and 244.)The fifteenth-century alchemist THOMAS NORTON was peculiar in his views, inasmuch as he denied that metals have seed.
He writes: "Nature never multiplies anything, except in either one or the other of these two ways: either by decay, which we call putrefaction, or, in the case of animate creatures, by propagation. In the case of metals there can be no propagation, though our Stone exhibits something like it.... Nothing can be multiplied by inward action unless it belong to the vegetable kingdom, or the family of sensitive creatures.
But the metals are elementary objects, and possess neither seed nor sensation."[1]
[1] THOMAS NORTON: _The Ordinal of Alchemy_. (See _The Hermetic Museum_, vol. ii. pp. 15 and 16.)His theory of the origin of the metals is astral rather than phallic.
"The only efficient cause of metals," he says, "is the mineral virtue, which is not found in every kind of earth, but only in certain places and chosen mines, into which the celestial sphere pours its rays in a straight direction year by year, and according to the arrangement of the metallic substance in these places, this or that metal is gradually formed."[2]
[2] _Ibid_., pp. 15 and 16.
In view of the astrological symbolism of these metals, that gold should be masculine, silver feminine, does not surprise us, because the idea of the masculinity of the sun and the femininity of the moon is a bit of phallicism that still remains with us.
It was by the marriage of gold and silver that very many alchemists considered that the _magnum opus_ was to be achieved.
Writes BERNARD of TREVISAN: "The subject of this admired Science [alchemy] is _Sol_ and _Luna_, or rather Male and Female, the Male is hot and dry, the Female cold and moyst."The aim of the work, he tells us, is the extraction of the spirit of gold, which alone can enter into bodies and tinge them.
Both _Sol_ and _Luna_ are absolutely necessary, and "whoever . . .
shall think that a Tincture can be made without these two Bodyes, . . . he proceedeth to the Practice like one that is blind."[1]
[1] BERNARD, Earl of TREVISAN: _A Treatise, etc., Op. cit_. pp. 83 and 87.
KELLY has teaching to the same effect, the Mercury of the Philosophers being for him the menstruum or medium wherein the copulation of Gold with Silver is to be accomplished.
Mercury, in fact, seems to have been everything and to have been capable of effecting everything in the eyes of the alchemists. Concerning gold and silver, KELLY writes:
"Only one metal, viz. gold, is absolutely perfect and mature.
Hence it is called the perfect male body. . . Silver is less bounded by aqueous immaturity than the rest of the metals, though it may indeed be regarded as to a certain extent impure, still its water is already covered with the congealing vesture of its earth, and it thus tends to perfection.
