First principle: the Primordial Energy is divided into four kinds of energies: Fire, Air, Water and Earth which we have just mentioned. Fire and Air concern the spiritual elements. Water and Earth concern matter.
In matter, the active element of the preparation of the purification is Water. In the spiritual (the soul, the spirit) the active element is the Fire which operates the purification and the initiation.
The Fire Energy is the most important one for the alchemist because it is the most conscious and the most powerful; it is the only one with a true power of initiation in man and in matter. Therefore it should be the subject of a thorough study.
Second principle: the energy of the element Fire is transmitted to the earth through the sun. When it arrives in the earthly atmosphere, Fire is not determined, i.e. it does not belong to any of the three kingdoms.
If it is breathed by man or by animals, it is then determined in the animal kingdom.
If it is absorbed by the leaves of the plants, it is then determined in the vegetable kingdom.
If it is absorbed by the water of the rain, after running of and infiltration, it will be determined in the mineral realm.
Once determination has occurred, it is irreversible. For the energy to change its determination, it must leave the earth, return to its original state and start the cycle again.
This determination gives to the Fire energy a power of consciouness, which is weak in the mineral, medium in the vegetable realm, strong in the animal and at its strongest in man.
In addition, in each of the kingdoms, the energy Fire has several levels of resonance about which we'll say something further on.
The entire key to alchemy is contained in the correct manipulation of the energies through the various vessels.
Manipulation of the Fire energy;
1. The transfer of the energy can only occur in the liquid state;
2- The solid state fixates the energy and prevents its returning to its level of resonance;
3- A mixture of solid bodies does not permit the energy transfer.
Examples for 1 : (the words here must be understood in their old meanings)
The marcasites, insoluble bodies, cannot transfer their energies when in the state of matters.
- Marcasite: metallic sulfur (sulfide)
The vitriols, soluble bodies, can be dissolved and the transfer of their energies is possible.
- Vitriol: metallic sulfate.
The solid ores keep their energy, same with the snow. During fusion, the energy is liberated. Mercury, the liquid metal, has lost its energy and can only be revivified if an energy that can be fixated is transmitted to it, which will then prevent its departing the liquid state.
Example for 3:
Transfer of the energy of the lead: galena, insoluble lead sulfide, will be transformed by soft and long calcinations into oxisulfide which, later attacked by the vinegar, will yield a soluble acetate making thus the transfer possible.
Analogy between the three realms:
The alchemical processes are always in agreement with nature. They only differ in the speed of execution. One of the first rules to consider is that thg Creating Fire is stimulated, energized by the fire of the earth.
The fire of the earth is the little king of this world and it is the one which lights the Fire of the Great King. In this laboratory work we light up the small fire which lights up the great Inner Fire.
The Secret Fire or Sophie Fire is not animated in its natural state. Thus, in eggs kept in the refrigerator, the secret Fire remains non active. In that state the egg is not fragile and can even endure long term temperature variations.
When the fire of the earth has awakened the Secret Fire the latter becomes very fragile; very slight differences of temperature and short-term temperature variations are possible. Generally the temperature limits are those of the human body.
In the same way that in the incubator the temperature is maintained until the birth of the chick, so the temperature will be maintained until the maturation of the Work.
Fire and Qabala:
It is impossible to understand the alchemical phenomena very well without referring to the Qabala and particularly to the hermetic book of the AESH METZARETH (Purifying Fire).
The Qabala says that the Universe is divided in 10 levels of energy condensation and that in each of these levels there is an agreement between density consciouness, life, energy, etc... As for alchemy, it does not deal with the two highest levels.
The Qabala calls "Mezla" the Primordial Energy, and explains that this energy descends and becomes more dense always following the same path. The energy of Mezla constantly arrives and condenses on the earth. Then each solid mixture retains and fixates in itself the level of energy of Mezla with which it resonates until that metal or mixture has reached the level of energy that is correct for it.
To avoid too qabalistic a vocabulary, we will use for each level only the name of its metal or of its planet. So we have: Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, the Sun, Venus, Mercury, the Moon, the Earth or: lead, tin, iron, gold, copper, mercury, silver, antimony.
In each level, the four elements are present and are in agreement with that specific level.
In each level. Fire is the element of power, it is the master of the level.
In addition there is a hierarchy in the levels because each of them transcends the ones that are inferior to it. This illlustrates what the Ancients say about Saturn, i.e. that it is the Medium Coeli, that it is the most powerful and that it is the only one to access all the laws of the manifested world. That is why, in Saturn, the Fire of lead is the most active alchemical element and will be used in a path of the descent. We start from the highest element to reestablish one after the other the successive lower levels. The trouble in the descending ways is that the volatile Fire is very very difficult to fixate. But an ascending path is also possible like the one of antimony.
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ANTIMONY OR THE LEAD OF THE SAGES
All processes based on antimony will obligatorily be processes of the reascent.
Basil Valentine says that antimony has seven planets, seven colors, and the explanation of it is as follows: with each step of its descent the energy is marked by the level it goes through, i.e. the energy arriving at the level of the sun, for instance, is already marked by Saturn, Jupiter and Mars. Thus when the energy arrives at the level of the Earth there is incorporation into the antimony and it has then in itself the marks of the seven planerts, of the seven traditional metals.
Fundamental principle of the work on metals and secrets of the antimony:
If we melt a metal (liquid state), the energy is no longer fixed, it is released at its planetary level. Thus, the fusion of iron releases the energy at the level of Mars, the fusion of galena releases that same energy at the level of Saturn. In these two cases, the Fire reintegrates the higher worlds and thus becomes inaccessible to the process of the physical world of man. But the fusion of antimony, for one, releases its Fire which remains in its world: the Earth, since it is its level. That is why antimony is the only metal that undergo fusion without losing its Inner Fire, which does not mean that some kind of carelessness or clumsiness cannot burn it up.
We need two elements in the experiments: the Fire of antimony in the ways of evolution: or the Fire of antimony and the metallic "seed" in the agricultural ways, i.e. the ways of the matrixes where the seed will produce the metal from which it is issued. It is the same thing in the ways of the amalgams and of cinnabar, which we shall see later.
THE MINERAL SEED
In the egg, the support of the seed is the sperm but the true seed belongs to the domain of the Invisible, it is the Secret Fire determined in the animal realm. This Fire is first inanimate and the earthly fire of the incubator renders it active.
In the seed of wheat for instance, the phenomenon is the same, except that the Secret Fire is determined in the vegetable kingdom and that the humid heat of the earth animates it. This secret Fire is also determined by its support, the grain of wheat, its "magnet". The Fire determined by the grain of wheat can only produce wheat.
In the mineral realm, the Secret Fire, first undetermined will be first determined in the realm itself, and then into a metal. Thus only the Secret Fire determined for silver will produce silver; only the Secret Fire determined for gold, will produce gold, and so on.
But we should note a very important point here, that is, if the determination of the Fire in the mineral realm is irreversible, it is not the same with the determination of a metal. Which explains that Mezla, the secret fire, goes through the successive determinations of the seven metals before completing its path in antimony.
Recouping of the various elements of the scoriae is in fact recouping the supports of the metallic seed. This seed must be revivified in the process of the amalgams by the Fire of antimony which has been transferred by the Philosophical Mercury in the seed. Then, the support will determinate the metal produced for the energy, generally silver or gold. But the choice of another support could lead in principle to the generation of any other metal.
In this process the metal produced is an "initiated" metal.
We must take note that to awaken the Secret Fire the temperature is increasing according to the kingdom: vegetable, animal, mineral.
Ora et Labora!