From: ladislas@sobeco.com (Ladislas A.)
Newsgroups: alt.magick
Subject: Re: alchemy (was: Re: Dracula the Alchemist)
Date: 21 Jan 93 05:46:48 GMT
Organization: Sobeco Ernst & Young

In <C16CFC.I6H@HQ.Ileaf.COM> rap@HQ.Ileaf.COM (Roger Powell) writes:

>Some thoughts on the nature of alchemy:
>
>Transmutation:
>
>It certainly strikes me as physically _possible_ that the lead generally
>available to the Alchemist routinely contained a small amount of gold as an 
>impurity, and that the alchemical processes of transmutation were actually
>slow-acting, highly efficient refinement techniques, rather than the nuclear 
>transmutations we think of today.

This has been said many times in the past.  In 1618, Jean-Baptiste Van Helmont,
a reknowned scientist who discovered gases, was visited by a stranger who
claimed he could prove that any metal could be transmutted into gold using
the pilosopher's stone.  The stranger gave Van Helmont a small quantity of a
reddish, heavy and sparkling powder.  He instructed Van Helmont in the way to
conduct the experiment and left.  Van Helmont used 8 ounces of mercury for the
experiment.  Once the metal had melted, he wrapped the powder into a piece of
paper and dropped in the "creuset" (could someone translate that for me please!)
and let it sit for 15 minutes.  When it was ready, he cooled it and broke it.
Within he found the same amount of pure gold as he had put of mercury.
If you seek references for this story, you may read Jacques Sadoul's _Le_
Tresor_Des_Alchimistes_ or Van Helmont's _Ortus_Medicinae_.  You can also
consult Philalethes' book _The_Marrow_Of_Alchemy_ for a similar story.

>                                 As I understand it, even extracting a very 
>small amount of gold from a large-ish mass of lead would be an alchemically 
>satisfactory result. Quantity seems not to have been the point.

Not quite.  The Stone, when properly made, should give you an equal amount of
gold from the metal used.  Quantity is the point.

>Life extension:
>
>This one I can't really see. The thing is, life extension is perceived as
>such a highly desirable goal that even the *suggestion* that it might be
>possible would be sufficient to keep people searching for it indefinitely,
>even without any tangible evidence. I'm not ready to rule it out as a
>possibility, but I have to classify it as "highly improbable";

There is very little evidence that can be given about this.  The only story
I remember is that of Nicolas Flamel and his wife.  They "died" and were
buried in the church's cemetary.  For some reason, their coffins were dug up
later and contained only pieces of wood.  Legend (for what else can it be 
called) has it that Nicolas Flamel and his wife were seen in India a century
later.
Since there is no tangible evidence, I would classify it as unverified.
If it is possible to regenerate cells, then it is probable that life can be
extended.

>Physical vs Metaphorical:
>
>The sense I get is that the alchemists were Very Serious about their metaphors,
>in that the vital, psychological, spiritual, and divine resonances of an
>alchemical metaphor flow from the physical implementation; without the 
>physical base, the rest are just words. This idea turns up in wimpier form
>in some other magical philosophies; my impression is that the alchemists
>really meant it.

There have been people who decided to take the metaphors at face value.  Some
died of poisoning, some blew up their laboratories, some even died of acute
constipation because they thought that the Materia Prima was their excrements
and the athanor was their bowels.

What alchemists were very serious about was their secrecy.  Even today, if one
proves s/he is capable of changing lead into gold, s/he runs a very high risk of
ending up in a governmental facility where her/his work will be "facilitated".

>--roger
>rap@HQ.Ileaf.COM

>Disclaimer: Interleaf, Inc. has nothing to do with alchemy.

Ladislas.