LIVES
OF
Alchemystical Philosophers
BASED ON MATERIALS COLLECTED IN 1815
AND
SUPPLEMENTED BY RECENT RESEARCHES
WITH A PHILOSOPHICAL DEMONSTRATION OF THE TRUE
PRINCIPLES OF THE MAGNUM OPUS, OR GREAT WORK
OF ALCHEMICAL RE-CONSTRUCTION, AND SOME
ACCOUNT OF THE SPIRITUAL CHEMISTRY
BY
ARTHUR EDWARD WAITE
AUTHOR OF
“THE REAL HISTORY OF THE ROSICRUCIANS;” “THE MYSTERIES OF MAGIC:
A DIGEST OF THE WRITINGS OF ÉLIPHAS LÉVI,” ETC.
TO WHICH IS ADDED
A BIBLIOGRAPHY OF ALCHEMY AND
HERMETIC PHILOSOPHY
LONDON
GEORGE REDWAY, YORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN
1888
[Pg 5]
The foundation of this work will be found in “The Lives ofAlchemystical Philosophers; with a Critical Catalogue of Books inOccult Chemistry, and a Selection of the most celebrated Treatises onthe Theory and Practice of the Hermetic Art,” which was published inthe year 1815 by Lackington, Allen, & Company, of Finsbury Square,London. This anonymous book has been attributed by certain collectorsto Francis Barrett, author of the notorious treatise entitled “TheMagus, or Celestial Intelligencer;” but it may be safely affirmedthat, alike in matter and treatment, it far transcends the extremelymeagre capacities of that credulous amateur in occultism. It is indeeda work of much sense and unpretentious discrimination, and is now abibliographical rarity which is highly prized by its possessors.
The independent researches which have supplemented the biographicalmaterials of the original compilation have produced in the presentvolume what is practically a new work under an old title; those liveswhich have been left substantially untouched as to facts have been moreor less rewritten with a view to the compression of prolixities and theelimination of archaic forms, which would be incongruous in a work soextensively modified by the addition of new details. The “AlphabeticalCatalogue of Works[Pg 6] on Hermetic Philosophy” has been considerablyenlarged from such sources as Langlet du Fresnoy’s Histoire de laPhilosophie Hermétique. The preliminary account of the “PhysicalTheory and Practice of the Magnum Opus” is a slight original sketchwhich, to readers unacquainted with alchemy, will afford some notionof the processes of accredited adepts. The introductory essay on theobject of alchemical philosophy advocates new and important viewsconcerning the great question of psychal chemistry, and appreciatesat their true worth the conflicting theories advanced by the variousschools of Hermetic interpretation.
IMPORTANT NOTE.
I am forced to append to this Preface a correction of one or twoerrors of absolutely vital importance, which were unfortunatelyoverlooked in the text. On page 188, line 18, the date was intendedto read 1643; on page 189, line 5, read anno trigesimo tertiofor trigesimo anno; and on line 6, anno vigesimo tertioinstead of vigesimo anno. But if these emendations restorethe passage to its original integrity, a discovery which I have madewhile this work wa