Want a clear method of discovering alchemy? Good news, everybody! The alchemists offer you this simply and consistently. Here’s their advice alongside two frequently echoed axioms “Ora et Labora” and “Natura, Ratio, Experientia & Lectio”. The method of alchemy is not found in complex recipes but in adherence to these simple instructions. No beakers required.
Ora et labora
-St. Benedict
Ora
A glib chemistry teacher once said that ‘ora’ was necessary to the ‘labora’ because heck… you best be praying for your life if you’re doing crazy chemical experiments. From a modern perspective focused on the physical, it’s easy to see why we’d assume that prayer is a mere accessory to the work. But prayer and work are equally important.
“After I have studied the science for many years, I learned by the special grace and wonderful teaching of God, the subject of the Stone. How much trouble, vain work, care, unrest, and expense, both in laboratory and in travelling I might have spared myself if I had known it sooner at the beginning, but I had to wait the time till God sent it.” -Khunrath
The alchemist is pictured at his oratory on the left of the image. The laboratory lies on the right. Text is integrated throughout the illustrations and is best viewed at a higher resolution.
“This Art being given by Divine inspiration, and as a secret revealed from above, we implore God’s help for every part of our work, the small as well as the great, for He alone hath the power to give or to withhold this knowledge from whomsoever He will. No one taketh this honour to himself, but God alone can enlighten the eyes and lift the cloud of natural mysteries, so that albeit you cannot understand the plainest things without Him, yet will you apprehend the most difficult arcana if He give you light.” -Edward Kelly, The Theatre of Terrestrial Astronomy
Donum Dei
O God the Father, which art of all the beginning and end,
-Lambspring
We beseech thee for the sake of our Lord Jesus Christ
To enlighten our minds and thoughts,
That we may praise Thee without ceasing,
And accomplish this Book according to Thy will!
“To the honour of the One God, who is Three Persons in One, this book has been written, […] For my part, I desire none of that fame which the world can give, but only your prayers to God for me, though you need not utter my name.” -Thomas Norton
“Coction, time, and patience are what you need;
-Lambspring
If you would enjoy the precious reward,
You must cheerfully give both time and labour.”
In Chymicis uersanti Natura, Ratio, Experientia & lectio, sint Dux, scipio, perspicilia & lampas
Natura
“Therefore the first intention must be to intimately contemplate Nature and to see how she proceeds in her operations, to this end that the natural Subjects of Chemistry, without defect or superfluity may be attained to. From whence let Nature be thy Guide and Companion of so great a journey, and follow her Footsteps.” – Maier
“Know for certain that Nature is wonderfully simple; and that the characteristic mark of a childlike simplicity is stamped upon all that is true and noble in Nature. If you would imitate Nature, you should take her simplicity for your model in all the operations of Art.” -Sendivogius
Ratio
Ratio et Experientia Fundamentum operis firmu stabilis supraedificat.
-Hamuel
Experiencia
“In the next place, let Reason be like a Staff which may keep the feet steady and Firm, that they may not slip nor Waver; for without reasoning, any person will be apt to fall into Error. Whence the Philosophers say, “Whatever you hear, reason upon it, whether it can be so or no.” For no man is forced to believe or Act Impossibilities, unless he be of a Weak memory, Dull genius, and foolish Imagination to impose upon himself by taking false thing for True, and rejecting true things as False. They say likewise that they take no care of the Words that are said, but rather of the Things as they may be Understood; and that words are for Things, and not things for Words. As for example, if any man should ask if Glass may be made malleable by the Philosophical Tincture? Well, why should I not believe it, provided reason vitiates it?” – Maier
“For if any man who never saw fire proved by satisfactory arguments that fire burns. His hearer’s mind would never be satisfied, nor would he avoid the fire until he put his hand in it that he might learn by experiment what argument taught.” -Roger Bacon
“Experience will be as spectacles by which things may be seen at a distance. These are Optic instruments invented and made by Art, to help and amend the weakness of men’s eyes. Not unlike these are all Experiments of every kind, that have been tried about the Mineral matter, whether seen or truly related, and the more these remain in the Memory the more will be drawn from thence by a man of Reason, who will compare them with themselves, and other things, that he may see what is truth, and what is not.” – Maier
“Experiment is manifest demonstration of the truth, and resolution the putting away of doubt. We cannot be resolved of any doubt save by experiment, and therefore is no better way to make it than on ourselves.” -Gerhard Dorn
Lectio
Ora, lege, lege, lege, relege, labora et invenies.
-Mutus Liber
“Fourthly, Reading does as it were, kindle a clear Lamp in the Understanding, without which there will everywhere be darkness and Thick Clouds. But the reading of Good Authors ought to be often repeated, otherwise it will not be profitable.
Kenar Bacassar in the Turba saith, “He therefore that is of an even Temper and exercises Patience without regret, will go in the right path of this Art. But he that thinks himself able sooner to reap benefit from our Books, is deceived, and it had been better for him not to have looked into or touched them.” -Maier
Naked Alchemy Projections 