1 Confirmation of this may be found in the work of the alchemist and mystic John Pordage (1607–1681), “Ein Philosophisches Send-Schreiben vom Stein der Weissheit,” printed in Roth-Scholtz, Deutsches Theatrum chemicum, I, pp. 557-596. For text, see my “Psychology of the Transference,” pars. 507ff.
2 Condemned to death under Ferdinand I, and executed in Prague, May 2, 1531. See Psychology and Alchemy, par. 480 and n.
3 “Addam et processum sub forma missae, a Nicolao Cibinensi, Transilvano, ad Ladislaum Ungariae et Bohemiae regem olim missum,” Theatr. chem., III (1659), pp. 758ff.
4 “Pharmaco ignito spolianda densi est corporis umbra” (The drug being ignited, the shadow of the dense body is to be stripped away). Maier, Symbola aureae mensae, p. 91.
5 ‘H ϕὑσις τῇ ϕὑσις τέρπεται, καὶ ἡ ϕὑσις τὴν ϕὑσιν νικᾷ, καὶ ἡ ϕὑσις τἡν ϕὑσιν κρατεῑ Berthelot, Alch, grecs, II, i, 3,
6 Preisendanz, Papyri Graecae Magicae, I. p. III.
7 “Miseros hoc loco mortales, quibus primum ac optimum thesaurum (quam naturae monarchia in se claudit) natura recusavit, puta, naturae lumen,” De vita longa, ed. Bodenstein, p. 88.
8 “Liber Azoth,” p. 534.
9 “De pestilitate,” Tract. I, ed. Huser, I, p. 334.
10 “Nihil enim aliud mors est, nisi dissolutio quaedam, quae ubi accidit, tum demum moritur corpus. . . . Huic corpori Deus adiunxit aliud quoddam, puta coeleste, id quod in corpore vitae existit. Hoc opus, hic labor est, ne in dissolutionem, quae mortalium est et huic soli adiuncta, erumpat.” (For death is nothing but a kind of dissolution which takes place when the body dies. . . . To this body God has added a certain other thing of a heavenly nature, that of the life which exists in the body. This is the task, this the toil: that it burst not forth at the dissolution which is the lot of mortals, but is joined to this [body] alone.) “Fragmenta,” ed. Sudhoff, III, p. 292.
11 “Sequuntur ergo qui vitam aeream vixerunt, quorum alii a 600 annis ad 1000 et 1 too annum pervenerunt, id quod iuxta praescriptum magnalium quae facile deprehenduntur, ad hunc modum accipe: Compara aniadum, idque per solum aera, cuius vis tanta est, ut nihil cum illo commune habeat terminus vitae. Porro si abest iam dictus aer, erumpit extrinsecus id, quod in capsula delitescit. Jam si idem ab illo, quod denuo renovatur fuerit refertum, ac denuo in medium perlatum, scilicet extra id sub quo prius delitescebat, imo adhuc delitescit, iam ut res tranquilla prorsus non audiatur a re corporali, et ut solum aniadum adech, denique et edochinum resonet.” Lib. V, cap. III.
Dorn (De vita longa, p. 167) comments on this passage as follows:
a) The imitation of Aniadus is eftected under the influence of “imaginationis, aestimationis vel phantasiae,” which is equivalent to “air” = spirit. By this is obviously meant the kind of active imagination that takes place in yoga or in the spiritual exercises of Ignatius Loyola, who employs the terms consideratio, contemplatio, meditatio, ponderatio, and imaginatio per sensus for the “realization” of the imagined content. (Cf. The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius Loyola, trans. Rickaby, in particular pp. 40ff., the meditation on Hell.) The realization of Aniadus has about the same purpose as the contemplation of the life of Jesus in these exercises, with the difference that in the former case it is the unknown Primordial Man who is assimilated through individual experience, whereas in the later it is the known, historical personality of the Son of Man.
b) The lack of air is explained by Dorn as due to the fact that it was “exhausted” by the efforts required for the realization.
c) That which bursts forth from the heart is evil, which dwells in the heart. Dorn continues: “Indeed it is constrained under the vehicle under which it still lies hid.” His conjecture of evil and constraint is not supported by the text. On the contrary, Dorn overlooks the preceding depuratio as a result of which the operation takes place in an already purified (“calcined”) body. The reverberatio and the subsequent subliming processes have already removed the denser elements, including the nigredo and evil.
d) As a result of his conjecture Dorn is obliged to read “intranquilla” for “tranquilla.”
e) Dorn here defines Adech as the “imaginary inner man” and Edochinum as Enochdianum.
12 “Lapidis philosophorum nomina,” MS. 2263-64, Ste. Geneviève, Paris, vol. II, fol. 129, and Pernety, Fables égyptiennes et grecques, I, pp. 136ff.
13 “Psychology and Religion,” p. 60.
14 Cf. “A Psychological Approach to the Dogma of the Trinity,” pp. 164ff.
15 Lib. V, cap. V. Jesahach is not a known Hebrew word.
16 Concerning the logical aspect of this arrangement see Schopenhauer, “On the Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason.”
17 Even at that time phantasia meant a subjective figment of the mind without objective validity.
18 An image-making, form-giving, creative activity of the mind. For Paracelsus it was the corpus astrale, or the creative power of the astral man.
19 By this is meant “philosophical” thinking.
20 Ruland was a Protestant.
21 “Whereby we attain not merely prolonged but eternal life,” adds Ruland. Dorn (De vita longa, pp. 176f.) agrees with Ruland’s psychological interpretation.
22 [Sudhoff, XIV, p. 644. This could be translated either as “Ye pious sons, Scaiolae and Anachmi” (nom. pl.) or as “Ye pious sons of Scaiola (gen. fem. sing.) and Anachmus” (gen. masc. sing.). Scaiolae must be fem. and therefore can hardly be in apposition to “filii.” The quotation has been located and checked, and begins: “Now mark well in this my philosophy: I have written a special treatise on the nymphis, pygmaeis, silvestribus, gnomis for the love and delectation of the true Scaiolis (den waren Scaiolis zuliebe und gefallen). Therefore, ye pious filii Scaiolae et Anachmi . . .” This may be Jung’s source for the statement that the “Scaioli are lovers of wisdom.” (If Scaiolis is taken as masc. in this context, the nom. sing, would be Scaiolus and the nom. pl. Scaioli.) Cf. Psychology and Alchemy, par. 422, n. 50: “Scayolus . . . means the adept.” Neither Scaiolus nor Scaioli can be traced from the Registerband to the Sudhoff edn., compiled by Martin Müller (Einsiedeln, 1960).—TRANSLATOR.]
23 For this reason it is said that the lapis or filius contains the four elements or is their quintessence, which can be extracted from them, like Aniadus.
24 “In quo me plurimum offendunt Scaiolae” (Dorn, p. 174).
25 Ibid., p. 177.
26 The following passages from Pico della Mirandola (Opera omnia, I, p. 3018), on the Cabalistic interpretation of Adam, may have been known to Paracelsus: “Dixit namque Deus: Ecce Adam sicut unus ex nobis, non ex vobis inquit, sed unus ex nobis. Nam in vobis angelis, numerus est et alteritas. In nobis, id est, Deo, unitas infinita, aeterna, simplicissima et absolutissima. . . . Hinc sane coniicimus alterum quendam esse Adam coelestem, angelis in coelo demonstratum, unum ex Deo, quem verbo fecerat, et alterum esse Adam terrenum. . . . Iste, unus est cum Deo, hic non modo alter est, verumetiam alius et aliud a Deo. . . . Quod Onkelus . . . sic interpretatur. . . . Ecce Adam fuit unigenitus meus.” (And God said, Lo, Adam is as one of us—he said not “of you,” but “of us.” For in you angels there is number and difference; but in us, that is, in God, there is unity, infinite, eternal, simple, and absolute. . . . Hence we clearly conjecture that there is a certain other heavenly Adam, shown to the angels in heaven, the one from God, whom he made by his word, and the other, earthly Adam. . . . The former is one with God, the latter not only second, but other and separate from God. . . . Which Onkelos thus interprets: Lo, Adam was my only begotten son.)
27 See next note and par. 214.
28 “Porro si pro ratione Necroliorum Scaiolis insereret, esset quod excipiendum ducerem, id quod maximus ille Adech antevertit et propositum nostrum, at non modum deducit: Quod vobis Theoricis discutiendum relinquo” (De vita longa, ed. Dorn, pp. 174f). Necrolii are the adepts (“Liber Azoth,” p. 524). Necrolia or necrolica means “medicine conserving life” (De vita longa, p. 173).
29 The Monogenes (filius unigenitus) is identical with the city, and his limbs with its gates. Cf. Baynes, A Coptic Gnostic Treatise, pp. 58 and 89; also Psychology and Alchemy, pars. 138f.