Tree of Life

Whilst the greatest effort has been made to ensure the quality of this text, due to the historical nature of this content, in some rare cases there may be minor issues with legibility. Alchemy, however, in its broader scope, means the science of solar rays. Gold may be traced to the Sun's rays. The word gold means solar essence. The transmutation of gold does not mean the process of making gold, but does mean the process of changing gold, solar rays, into all manner of materialized forms, vegetable, mineral, etc. The ancient alchem ist studied the process of Nature in her operations from the volatile to the fixed, the fluid to the solid, the essence to the substance, or the abstract to the concrete, all of which may be summed up in the changing of spirit into matter. In reality, the alchem ist did not try to do anything. He simply tried to search out nature's processes in order that he might comprehend her marvelous operations. To be sure, language was used that to us seems symbolical and often contradictory, but it was not so intended, nor so at all in reality. We speak in sym bols. If a man is in delirium, caused by alcohol in his brain-cells, we say he has snakes in his boots. Of course, no one supposes that the words are to be taken literally. Yet if our civilization should be wiped out, and our literature translated after four or five thousand years, those who read our history might be puzzled to know what was meant by snakes in his boots.