Lives of alchemystical philosophers

The foundation of this work will be found in “The Lives of Alchemystical Philosophers; with a Critical Catalogue of Books in Occult Chemistry, and a Selection of the most celebrated Treatises on the Theory and Practice of the Hermetic Art,” which was published in the year 1815 by Lackington, Allen, & Company, of Finsbury Square, London. This anonymous book has been attributed by certain collectors to Francis Barrett, author of the notorious treatise entitled “The Magus, or Celestial Intelligencer;” but it may be safely affirmed that, alike in matter and treatment, it far transcends the extremely meagre capacities of that credulous amateur in occultism. It is indeed a work of much sense and unpretentious discrimination, and is now a bibliographical rarity which is highly prized by its possessors.

The independent researches which have supplemented the biographical materials of the original compilation have produced in the present volume what is practically a new work under an old title; those lives which have been left substantially untouched as to facts have been more or less rewritten with a view to the compression of prolixities and the elimination of archaic forms, which would be incongruous in a work so extensively modified by the addition of new details. The “Alphabetical Catalogue of Works on Hermetic Philosophy” has been considerably enlarged from such sources as Langlet du Fresnoy’s Histoire de la Philosophie Hermétique. The preliminary account of the “Physical Theory and Practice of the Magnum Opus” is a slight original sketch which, to readers unacquainted with alchemy, will afford some notion of the processes of accredited adepts. The introductory essay on the object of alchemical philosophy advocates new and important views concerning the great question of psychal chemistry, and appreciates at their true worth the conflicting theories advanced by the various schools of Hermetic interpretation.

IMPORTANT NOTE.

I am forced to append to this Preface a correction of one or two errors of absolutely vital importance, which were unfortunately overlooked in the text. On page 188, line 18, the date was intended to read 1643; on page 189, line 5, read anno trigesimo tertio for trigesimo anno; and on line 6, anno vigesimo tertio instead of vigesimo anno. But if these emendations restore the passage to its original integrity, a discovery which I have made while this work was passing through the press has entirely cancelled its value. I have been gratified with a sight of the original edition of Philalethes’ Introitus Apertus--a small octavo pamphlet in the original paper cover as it was published at Amsterdam in the year 1667. It definitely establishes that its mysterious author was born in or about the year 1623, or two years later than the Welsh adept, Thomas Vaughan, with whom he has so long been identified. This original edition is excessively scarce; I believe I am the only English mystic who has seen it during the present generation. The reader must please understand that the calculation in the pages referred to was based on the date 1643; this date, in the light of the original edition, has proved erroneous, and by a curious chance, that which was accidentally printed, turns out to be correct at the expense of the calculation.