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In the Pronaos of the Temple of Wisdom

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Holy Blood, Holy Grail
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« Reply #90 on: May 11, 2009, 01:39:12 pm »

brother; which had never been carefully examined by the merchant. When Flamel examined that book, his curiosity became aroused by certain figures contained therein, and he began to suspect that it contained great secrets. He got the first leaf, which was written in Hebrew translated, and from the little he learned from that, he became convinced that his suspicion was well founded; but knowing also that great caution was necessary, he took the following steps: He went into Spain, and, as Jews were settled in many parts of that country, he applied in every place to which he came to the most learned, and engaged each of them to translate a leaf of the book. Having thus obtained a translation of the whole, he returned to France. When he came home, he undertook with his wife the prescribed labours, and in the progress of time they arrived at the secret, by which they acquired immense riches, which they employed in building public edifices, and in doing good to a great many people.

"'Fame is often accompanied by great dangers; but a true sage knows how to extricate himself from all kind of perils. Flamel saw that he was in danger of being suspected to possess the Philosopher's Stone, a suspicion which might have caused the loss of his liberty, if not that of his life, and he thought of means to escape all danger. By his advice, his wife pretended to be dangerously sick, and when it was reported that she had died, she had already safely passed the frontier of Switzerland. They buried in her place a wooden image in one of the churches which he had founded. Some time afterwards he used the same stratagem for himself and joined his wife. You know that there could have been no great difficulty in doing this, since in every country, if a man has sufficient money, physicians and priests are always at his service, ready to say or do whatever he directs them. He moreover left a last will and testament, directing that a pyramid should be erected to his memory and that of his wife. Since that time both have led a philosophic life, residing sometimes in one country and sometimes in another. This, depend upon my word, is the true history of Flamel and his wife.'"

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« Reply #91 on: May 11, 2009, 01:39:22 pm »

The well-known fact that the Adepts and alchemists of the middle ages were continually subject to persecutions, to imprisonment, punishment, torture and death, is the cause that the names of only few of them became publicly known. One reputed alchemist was the Count de Saint Germain, who lived in 1770 at the Court of France. He appeared to be, about forty years of age; some said he was ninety, he himself gave his age as being 370 years. He possessed the art of making artificial diamonds and precious stones, he was clairvoyant, could read people's thoughts and foretell future events. He possessed an "album," in which many of the most celebrated persons of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries had signed their names; he was able to write with both hands at one and the same time, with each on different subjects.

A somewhat similar character was the Count Cagliostro, whose

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« Reply #92 on: May 11, 2009, 01:39:33 pm »

physical form was born in Italy and received the name Giuseppe Balsamo. The latter was incarcerated in the castle San Angelo at Rome, and is believed to have died in one of its dungeons. The problem of Cagliostro will not be solved by our historians until they study the true nature of man in its normal and abnormal aspects, when they may, perhaps, discover the fact that two personalities may inhabit one physical organism, and that a man may, perhaps, be a Cagliostro at one time and a Balsamo at another. *

I have carefully read the proceedings of the trial of the renowned Count Cagliostro before the tribunal of the inquisition in Rome, and I have found no proof whatever of his having been an impostor. To everyone acquainted with even the elementary teachings of occultism, the phenomena which occurred in his presence do not appear at all unexplainable, or as having been the products of imposture; but what appears wonderful is the illogical consequence and ignorance of the witnesses for the prosecution, who admit the occurrence of phenomena in his presence, which could not have been produced by his tricks, while in the same breath they denounce him to be an impostor.

To arts of this kind belongs that of making pure gold or silver artificially, of transforming base metals into nobler ones; of preparing a Universal Panacea out of the principle of Life; of curing all diseases; of preparing a lamp which, by the manner in which it burns, indicates the state of health of an absent friend, with whom it is sympathetically connected; of producing a similar sympathetic or magnetic connection between a person and a jewel, a tree, or a mirror; of producing a living miniature image of the world in a closed glass globe; of causing the forms of vegetables or animals to reappear out of their ashes after they have been burnt; of producing artificially man (Homunculi) without the assistance of a female organism; of preparing a fluid, which rises and falls within the bottle where it is contained, according to the increasing or decreasing moon; of preparing a glass wherein it will thunder, and lightning will appear, whenever the same takes place in the air; of producing an inextinguishable


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« Reply #93 on: May 11, 2009, 01:39:44 pm »

magic fire, an ever-burning lamp; a magic mirror, where events can be seen taking place in any other part of the world; a perpetuum mobile, whose rotation is caused by the rotation of the earth; a divining rod, for finding water or minerals, or whatever one wishes to find; a magic ring, which warns the wearer of any approaching danger, and reveals to him many secrets; of causing love or hate at will; of making pearls, diamonds, or any other jewels, which cannot be distinguished from natural ones, or causing them to grow larger; of obtaining power over the elemental spirits of Nature and causing them to render services; of causing the astral spectres of dead persons to appear and talk and answer questions, and many other similar feats, too numerous to mention.

We call that wonderful which is not within our experience, and the causes of which we cannot explain; we are daily surrounded by marvels, and witnessing the most marvellous phenomena, the causes of which we cannot explain; but we do not look at them with a sceptical eye, nor are we at ail surprised that they occur. On the contrary, we should be extremely surprised if they once ceased to occur; this merely because we are accustomed to see such things every day. We are surrounded by phenomena of an occult and magic nature, and we live in a laboratory of alchemy. We see how out of a hard little stone—kernel or seed—a germ appears, and grows into a big tree, although we are sure that there was no such tree in the kernel; and what would be still more astonishing if it were not of daily occurrence, is that out of a certain kind of seed a certain species of plant only will grow, and no other. We see how out of an egg a living bird appears, and yet if we examine the same kind of egg as long as it is fresh, and open it, we find therein nothing living, and nothing that resembles a bird. We also know that the parent bird does not put a bird into the egg after it is laid, for we may hatch out eggs by artificial heat, and thus produce birds out of the egg, and there is surely no bird in the heat. We see how out of a vegetable substance animal substance can grow, for we feed our cattle on grass, hay, and corn, and yet we are certain that there is no flesh in the grass or corn. We see the ever-burning light of the sun spending its heat year after year. We know of nobody who supplies him with fuel, and yet it seems to have always the same temperature. We know that the globe whereon we live revolves and flies with tremendous velocity through space, and yet we do not feel it move, nor do we fall head foremost down in the abyss of space when at night it turns the dark side away from the sun; we see that the storm blows down houses and trees, and yet that which does the damage is nothing but thin air; we see the body of water of our rivers and lakes, and if we attempt to step on its surface we sink; but a few weeks or months afterwards we may try it again and find it as hard as rock, able to bear the weight of the skating crowd. There are a thousand other similar marvels in Nature, too numerous to mention.

There are many stories told of the Adepts, and the wonderful things

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« Reply #94 on: May 11, 2009, 01:39:57 pm »

they sometimes performed; how, in mid-winter, they caused beautiful flowers to grow out of the floor of a room, or produced a shower of roses in places where no roses were to be found; how some of them were seen simultaneously in two different places speaking and acting in each; how they sometimes were attended and served by "supernatural" beings appearing in human forms; how they were sometimes able to read the future, or see what was going on at a place hundreds of miles away from them; how they could speak languages which they had never studied; knew the contents of books which they had never read; could swallow poison without being harmed; make themselves invisible and visible at will, etc., etc. But the most interesting parts of our research, and at the same time the most pertinent to our object in view, will be historical accounts referring to their ability to make pure gold in an artificial manner—or, to speak more correctly, to transmute other metals into gold, and make gold grow. We shall therefore give a few abbreviated accounts of such authenticated facts:—

1. The following account is taken from the acta of the judicial faculty of Leipzig, whose legal decision was given in August, 1715. (Responsio Juridica Facultis Juridicæ Lipsiensis.) A few years ago a man arrived late in the evening at the residence of the Countess of Erbach, the castle of Tankerstein, and asked to be permitted to enter it, and to hide there a few days, as he had accidentally killed a deer belonging to the Palatine of Palatia, who was, therefore, pursuing him to take his life, and he asked to be protected. The Countess at first refused; but when she saw the man she was so much impressed with his noble appearance that she consented, and the stranger was given a room, where he stayed for a few days. After that he asked for an interview with the Countess, and when admitted to her presence, he expressed his thanks for the protection given to him, and offered that, as a token of his gratitude, he would transmute her silver ware into gold. The Countess at first could not believe that such a thing was possible, but she at last consented to have an experiment made with a silver tankard, which the stranger melted and transmuted into gold. She thereupon sent this gold to the city and had it tested by a goldsmith, who found it to be gold of the purest kind. She then permitted the stranger to melt and transmute all her silver spoons, plates, dishes, etc., into gold, which he did, and finally he took his leave and went away, having received a comparatively small sum of money as a gift from the Countess. Soon after this event, the husband of the Countess, who seems to have been a spendthrift, and who had been away from home for several years, serving as an officer in some foreign country, returned, because he had heard that his wife had become suddenly rich. He claimed half of the gold for himself, but the Countess refused to acknowledge his claims. The case came, therefore, before the Court, and the husband supported his claims by the fact that he was the lord of the territory (Dominus territorii).

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« Reply #95 on: May 11, 2009, 01:40:09 pm »

upon which the castle belonging to his wife was located, and that according to the laws of the country all treasures found upon that land were lawfully his. He therefore requested that the gold should be sold, and from the proceeds new silver ware should be bought for the Countess, and the surplus be given to him. The defendant claimed that artificially produced gold could not come under the consideration of a law referring to buried treasures, and that therefore the said law could not be applied in her case; that, moreover, the silver had been transmuted into gold for her own benefit, and not for that of another, and she begged the Court to be permitted to remain in undisturbed possession of it. The Court decided in her favour.

2. Another authenticated case is that of an Adept by the name of Sehfeld, who lived in Rodaun, a small place in the vicinity of Vienna. He made gold out of tin and spent it freely. The proprietor of the house where he resided, a man named Friedrich, gained the confidence of the Adept, and told his family about the doings of Sehfeld. The consequence was that soon rumours and gossip began to spread. Sehfeld was accused of sorcery, and appealed for protection to the Austrian Emperor, saying that he was engaged in making certain chemical colours of which he possessed the secret. It is said that Sehfeld paid 30,000 florins into the Imperial Treasury to obtain this protection, which he enjoyed for several months. Friedrich and the members of his family often were present when Sehfeld made gold, and they say that after melting the tin, he sprinkled a small quantity of a red powder upon the molten mass, when the latter began to foam and exhibited all kinds of colours. After an hour or so it was allowed to cool, and all the tin was then transmuted into pure gold. One day Friedrich attempted to make the experiment himself. Having obtained some of the red powder from Sehfeld, he melted the tin while Sehfeld was absent, and sprinkled the powder upon it; but the latter had no effect upon the tin and did not mix with it. After a while, Sehfeld entered the room where the experiment was made, and as he entered the mass began to foam and turned into gold. The security which he enjoyed did not last long, for after a few months new rumours were put into circulation, the envy, greed and jealousy of the neighbours were aroused, he was accused of practising unlawful sciences, and he was arrested at night and imprisoned in the fortress of Temeswar, where he remained over a year, sternly refusing to tell his secret, and saying that no amount of physical torture would be able to make him reveal it. The governor of the fortress of Temeswar, General Baron von Engelshofen, was so much charmed by the noble appearance and open character of Sehfeld, that he went to Vienna and spoke to the Emperor about Sehfeld, declaring his opinion that the latter was innocent. The Emperor soon afterwards, while hunting boars in a forest near Rodan, sent for Friedrich, and received from him a detailed account of his experiences with Sehfeld, and became convinced

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« Reply #96 on: May 11, 2009, 01:40:21 pm »

that the latter was not a villain; but he would not believe that he was able to make gold, and expressed his doubts to that effect. Upon this, Friedrich, who was an honest man, exclaimed, "Oh! your Majesty, if at this moment God were to come down from heaven, and say, 'Friedrich, you are mistaken; Sehfeld cannot make gold!' I would answer him, 'Dear God, it is nevertheless true that he can make it, because I know it to be so.'" Upon this, the Emperor, struck with the sincerity of the man, ordered that Sehfeld should be permitted to go where he pleased, and make whatever experiments he choose; but that he should not leave Austria, and should always be accompanied by two trustworthy officers who should never permit him to go out of their sight. Two of the best and most trustworthy officers belonging to noble families were selected for that purpose. He made several little excursions in their company; but not long afterwards Sehfeld and his two guards disappeared and never returned, nor has any trace of them ever been discovered. The historian adds that it is not probable that those two rich and noble officers would have sacrificed their career and also their reputation by thus deserting without having a sufficient cause or inducement to do so. Researches made in the house of Friedrich seemed to indicate that Sehfeld prepared his red powder out of some sky-blue minerals, probably some sulphuret of copper.

3. An apothecary at Halle made the acquaintance of a stranger, whom he found to be in possession of some chemical secrets. Having been invited to visit the stranger in his lodgings he went there, and after having talked about Alchemy, the claims of which the apothecary denied, the stranger showed him a certain red powder, and offered to give some of it to the apothecary so that the latter could make an experiment himself. With a very little spoon he took some of the powder out of the box wherein it was contained, but the apothecary objected that such a small quantity would not be sufficient to make the experiment. Upon this the stranger threw the powder back into the box, wiped the spoon, to which some of the powder adhered, on a piece of cotton, wrapped the cotton in a paper, and gave it to the apothecary, telling him that even this would be sufficient for that purpose. Having returned home, the apothecary took a big silver spoon, melted it in a crucible, and threw the cotton upon it. The molten metal began immediately to boil and to foam, and to exhibit the most beautiful colours. After a while he took the crucible from the fire and poured the metal into a mould. The next morning he examined it and found that it was the purest gold, and there were some ruby-red drops on the top, which seemed to have been the surplus of the red powder which the metal had not absorbed. The apothecary hurried immediately to the lodging of the Adept to tell him of his success; but the latter had gone, and no one knew where he went. A sum of money, more than sufficient to pay for his lodging, was found upon the table in his room. The silver which the apothecary

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« Reply #97 on: May 11, 2009, 01:40:30 pm »

employed in this experiment weighed 1¼ ounces, and the gold which he gained weighed 1½ ounces, which he sold to a goldsmith for 36 thalers. The gain in weight was, therefore, 20 per cent., which may be accounted for by the fact that the specific gravity of gold is greater than that of silver. Unfortunately, the ruby-red pearls on the surface of the gold were lost during the excitement caused by the discovery that the mass was actual gold, else they might have been used to transmute a far greater quantity of silver into gold.

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« Reply #98 on: May 11, 2009, 01:41:01 pm »


4. During the reign of the Emperor Leopold, a monk of the Order of St. Augustine, named Wenzel Seiler, found a certain red powder in his convent, which proved to be the "Red Lion" of the Alchemists. By means of this powder, Seiler transformed a quantity of tin into

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« Reply #99 on: May 11, 2009, 01:41:29 pm »

gold in the presence of the Emperor and his Court. The Emperor ordered that certain medals were to be made of this artificially produced gold, and he divided them out among the noblemen of his Court. He also, as a reward, gave to that monk the title of Freiherr von Rheinburg, and appointed him as master of the Imperial mint in Bohemia. The medal, of which one is now in the family of Count Leopold Hoffmann, in Brieg, shows upon the top the bust of the Emperor Leopold, with the following words:—"Leopoldus Dei Gratia Romanorum Imperator semper Augustus Germania Hungariæ et Bohemiæ Rex." The reverse side is not stamped, but there is engraved thereon a verse, saying:—


Aus Wenzel Seilers Pulvers Mach
Bin ich von Zinn zu Gold gemacht.

5. The most indisputable proof (if appearances can prove anything) of the possibility of transmuting base metals into gold, may be seen by everyone who visits Vienna; it being a medal preserved in the Imperial treasury chamber, and it is stated that this medal, consisting originally of silver, has been partly transformed into gold, by alchemical means, by the same Wenzel Seiler who was afterwards made a knight by the Emperor Leopold I. and given the title Wenzeslaus Ritter von Reinburg.

The medal is of oval shape; its long diameter is 37, and the short one 40 centimetre. Its specific gravity is 193, and its weight 7,200.4 grammes. Its value is estimated to correspond to 2,055 Austrian ducats.

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« Reply #100 on: May 11, 2009, 01:41:50 pm »

As indicated in the accompanying figure, about one-third of the upper part is silver, and the remaining part gold. The two incisions were made in 1883, for the purpose of examining the medal, to see whether it was pure or merely gilded. The examination was made on request of Professor A. Bauer, of Vienna.

One side of the medal shows the portraits of the ancestors of the Emperor, up to King Pharamund, the other side has the following inscription:—

Sacratissimo
Potentissimo et invictissimo
Romanorum imperatori
Leopoldo I.
Arcanorum naturæ scrutatori curiosmo
Genuinum hoc veræ ac perfectæ
Metamorphoseos metallicë
specimen
pro exiguo anniversarii diei nominalis
mnemosyno
cum omnigenæ prosperitatis voto
humillima veneratione offert et dicat p. 48
Joannes Wenzeslaos de Reinburg
numini majestatique eius
devotissimus
anno Christi MDCLXXVII. die festo
S. Leopoldi
ognomine pii olim marchionis Austriæ
nunc autem patroni augustissimæ
Domus austriacæ
Benignissimi.

It seems, however, that there is nothing perfectly reliable in this world of illusions, and it is therefore necessary to state that Wenzel Seiler was afterwards regarded as an impostor, and sent back to his monastery. Later on, however, the Emperor received him again into his favour, and even paid his numerous debts, the existence of which is quite incomprehensible if he actually had the power to make gold by alchemical means.


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« Reply #101 on: May 11, 2009, 01:42:14 pm »

Footnotes
36:* Before us is a paper, printed in Leipzig, dated May 26th, 1761, which gives the latest news from Köln (Cologne). It says: "The two prophets who have been imprisoned in this place are still keeping the attention of our citizens on the alert. The court has not yet decided what shall be done. It is useless to chain them, because they possess the wonderful power of bursting even the strongest chains, as if they were threads of linen, and they have done so in the presence of many. They can even in the darkest might see all objects p. 37 in their prison, because there is an unearthly light shining around their heads and coming out of their eyes, which illuminates their surroundings. They seem to be young men, and yet they say that they were at Constantinople in the year 1453, at the time of Mohamed II.; they say that they were intimately acquainted with the last Christian emperor at that place, Constantine Palaeologus, and they are in possession of letters written by him and his wife and sister. They say that at the time when they were at Constantinople they were already over 300 years of age. They speak Persian and Chinese and other languages fluently; they live on nothing but a little bread and water. They performed some wonderful cures in the neighbouring villages before they were arrested; savage dogs and wild animals appear to treat them with reverence; they seem to be well acquainted with the books written by the ancient philosophers, and talk about Pythagoras with great respect. We do not know what to think about these men. Etc., etc."

41:* Whether or not the body of a person may be inhabited simultaneously or alternatively by two different individualities, may be a matter for doubt; but the phenomena of obsession and hypnotism go to show that this is not impossible. Cagliostro said that he was born in the East, and it is certain that he had connections there; nevertheless, it was proved that he was born in Italy, and that his name was Balsamo. This would, of course, convict him at once among the ignorant of his times and among our writers of encyclopedias as being an impostor. Nevertheless, a more definite knowledge of the true constitution of man might explain the mystery. That which is the fundamental reality in man; is the will. The phenomena of so-called hypnotism show that the will of one person may be made to act in another, and during the time that a person is obsessed by the will of another, he is also under the influence of the memory of the latter. Those acquainted with occult laws will not find it incredible that the person of Balsamo was influenced and used by some eastern human spirit, whose name was Cagliostro, and that during such times Balsamo believed himself to be, and actually was, Cagliostro. Modern spiritualism has a legion of similar facts.



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