Children of Knowledge

*I’ve been the egg, I’ve been the shit, and now I’m reaching for the gold.*

“Better living through chemistry!” Once, that phrase epitomized the potential and promise of nuclear power, plastic polymers, and a host of brave new products guaranteed to make life easier and better. For most Awakened folks, it’s one of the most insidious catch-phrases ever coined by Technocratic propagandists. Even so, other mages know it in its original form: Unus es ab arte transcendit; est transcendens omnia per artem: “By the Art, one transcends; through the Art, all is transcendent.”

Throughout their long history, the Children – better known by their preferred title, the Solificati – have worked toward a singular, shining goal: enlightenment and Ascension through the ancient Arts and Sciences of Alchemy. Although people have practiced forms of alchemy as far back as the Sumerian era, most of these self-styled Crowned Ones trace their history to the ancient Egyptian court of Queen Hatshepsut. There, the great Queen’s cupbearers learned the secrets of the universe as revealed through alchemy, and they pledged to share those mysteries only with the worthiest of souls. In this way, the Solificati grew in number, travelling throughout Persia and North Africa, down the Silk Road to India and China, practicing mainly in small and solitary groups until they formally banded into an alchemist’s guild at the first gathering of what would become the Order of Reason.

Unfortunately, the alchemists soon realized that the Order was, shall we say, less than hospitable to their cause. The resulting false starts, purges, and dissolution echoed the various stages of alchemy – most notably putrefaction, the stage of decay that precedes renewal. Reforming under the Hermetic aegis in 1445, the Solificati became one of the original Nine Traditions. Soon, though, the scandal involving the Great Betrayer shattered the group’s unity once again. History reports that, in the aftermath of Heylel’s execution, the Solificati disbanded in disgrace and faded into the mists of time. As is usually the case with such claims of historical fact, the truth follows a different path. Ebb and flow, rise and retreat have marked the Solificati way since that group’s inception. That mass disappearance was just one more turning of a familiar cycle.

When the Solificati reemerged in the late 1950s – this time called the Children of Knowledge – their Art involved a potent new substance: LSD. Whether Dr. Alfred Hoffman and his team were true Children of Knowledge or simply chemists influenced by their discoveries, lysergic acid diethylamide heralded a radical new message: through alchemy (now called chemistry), the mind could open and the Masses could Ascend. The newer breed of Crowned Ones hustled this compound out among the Masses – sometimes wisely, often not. The predictable backlash blunted the compound’s potential benefits, but “the doors of perception” had been opened and could not easily be shut again.

This psychotropic method remains controversial even within the group. Once again, the Solificati split into factions. Some wound up joining the Order of Hermes in the late 1990s, whereas others jostled for their rightful title like former bandmates quarreling over the old band’s name. By the new millennium, two different groups had assumed the same confusing moniker – the Children growing tired of that diminutive name and the Crowns annoyed by the careless experiments and excesses of their peers. Both groups now claim the Solificati title, each one refusing to acknowledge those other idiots as the rightful heirs to that name.

Today’s Children of Knowledge are less likely to work alone in isolated candle-lit cells crammed with books, papers, and bizarre alchemical equipment, and far more inclined to form university research teams, think-tanks, psychotropic occultist sects, and club-going exploration groups. The last 25 years have seen these alchemists spread their chemical gospel through rave culture, neotribal spirit festivals, and the global adventures of nation-hopping neogypsy tribes. “At play in the fields of the mind,” they pursue the roles of chemical tricksters in whose hands the illusions of the real world get broken, scattered, and rearranged to form new and entertaining pictures. These Children get pretty serious about their play, though, and those new pictures include new visions for reality.

## Organization

As they have since the group’s inception, Solificati prefer to gather in small groups centered upon one or two Master Alchemists, two or three Adepts, and a handful of potential apprentices. The Masters set the agendas for study and activity, the Adepts refine the process, and the apprentices learn through practice, trial, and error. Academic study is crucial and secrecy even more so. Given their rough histories with both the Traditions and the Technocracy, this group has every right to feel paranoid. Perhaps this Disparate Alliance will finally provide security for the group’s ongoing Great Work.

## Initiation

To shake off their scientific preconceptions, newly Awakened Solificati (called “eggs,” in reference to the alchemical symbol for gestation) begin their training with the timehonored task of transforming base metals into silver or gold. Once she’s successfully completed this task, the egg gets tested by her Master to see if she understands the lesson behind the chore. The correct answer, of course, is that she is the base material and that gold symbolizes her ultimate potential.

## Affinity Sphere

Traditionally Matter, though some groups prefer Forces, Prime, or Entropy.

## Focus

Because the universe is one huge symphony of vibrating energy, magick is simply the application of one’s Will to influence and change the vibrations between one thing and another. The tools that symbolize and channel those vibrations – and that rearrange the perceptions of a viewer so that he can retune his own expectations about what is and is not possible – make such Greater Alchemy possible.

To a Child of Knowledge, Everything is Data, Chaos, or an Illusion, Prison, or Mistake. Knowledge – honed through alchemy, craftwork, crazy wisdom, the Art of Desire, chaos magick, and occasional hypertech – confers the truth behind life’s illusions. Magick, to a Solificatus, is the Art of Transmutation; it changes, refines, breaks down, and reassembles existing materials into newly formed energies.

## Glossary

   Below is the Lexicon or Glossary for the Children of Knowledge or Solfilcati

* **Egg** – Newly Awakened mage
* **Great Awakening** – The name for the event that, triggered by the Children of Knowledge, will cause a massive Paradigm shift in the belief of the nature of reality among the Sleepers, thus causing the creation of the Tenth Sphere.
* **Cununctio** – “Conjunctions”; three ranks of achievement within the craft
* **Hermium** – True Mercury; also the name of the third and most powerful Cununctio
* **Lunargent** – True Silver; also the name of the second Cununctio
* **Prima Materia** – The first and original material of all creation
* **Prima Vis** – Primal energy within all things; Quintessence
* **Orichalcum** – True Gold; also the first and lowest level Cununctio
* **Shop** – Common slang for a laboratory; short for workshop
* **Solificati** – (singular Solificato) The original name for the Children of Knowledge, cast out of the Traditions during the Great Betrayal; means “Crowned Ones”; also the highest rank of the Children of Knowledge.
* **Transcendental Enlightenment** – Alchemical jargon for Ascension
* **Unity** – Fabled “Tenth Sphere” of the Children of Knowledge