Coffee and Alchemy-The Theory of Alchemy

 Paracelsus and his work The Theory of Alchemy. 

Paracelsus:

As a physician of the early 16th Century, Paracelsus held a natural affinity with the Hermetic, neoplatonic, and Pythagorean philosophies central to the Renaissance. Paracelsus believed in the Greek concept of the four elements, but he also introduced the idea that, on another level, the cosmos is fashioned from three spiritual substances: the tria prima of mercury, sulfur, andsalt. These substances were not the simple substances we recognize today, but were rather broad principles that gave every object both its inner essence and outward form. Mercury represented the transformative agent (fusibility and volatility); sulfur represented the binding agent between substance and transformation (flammability); and salt represented the solidifying/substantiating agent (fixity and noncombustibility). For example, when a piece of wood is burnt, the products reflect its constitution: smoke reflects mercury, flame reflects sulfur, and ash reflects salt. The tria prima also defined the human identity. Sulfur embodied the soul, (the emotions and desires); salt represented the body; mercury epitomized the spirit (imagination, moral judgment, and the higher mental faculties).

 By understanding the chemical nature of the tria prima, a physician could discover the means of curing disease. Paracelsus pioneered the use of chemicals and minerals in medicine. His hermetical views were that sickness and health in the body relied on the harmony of man (microcosm) and Nature (macrocosm). He took an approach different from those before him, using this analogy not in the manner of soul-purification but in the manner that humans must have certain balances of minerals in their bodies, and that certain illnesses of the body had chemical remedies that could cure them. 

 Also Paracelsus is credited as providing the first clinical/scientific mention of the unconscious. In his work Von den Krankeiten he writes: "Thus, the cause of the disease chorea lasciva is a mere opinion and idea, assumed by imagination, affecting those who believe in such a thing. This opinion and idea are the origin of the disease both in children and adults. In children the case is also imagination, based not on thinking but on perceiving, because they have heard or seen something. The reason is this: their sight and hearing are so strong that unconsciously they have fantasies about what they have seen or heard."

Paracelsus believed in a vital force which radiated around every man like a luminous sphere and which could be made to act at a distance.  He is also credited with the early use of what we now know as hypnotism.  He believed that there was a star in each man, (Mishlove). This alludes to the essential Self, but is also literally in  that our elements were forged in some distant supernova.

Theory of Alchemy
A beginning:

So in understanding of what the metals correspond to in the planets and body we can then perhaps spread the outline to many other instances in nature and our lives .

Lead	Saturn	Sacral Plexus
Iron	Mars	Sexual Ganglion
Tin	Jupiter	Solar Plexus
Gold	Sun	Cardiac Plexus
Copper	Venus	Pharyngeal Plexus
Silver	Moon	Pituitary Body
Quicksilver	Mercury	Pineal Gland

Alchemy is not concerned exclusively with consciousness, but also seeks the subtle transformation of the body, so that the physical level is also brought into perfect equilibrium.  Thus, the alchemical metals may be considered analogous to the chakras of the yogis.

Mercury..........Sattva
Sulphur.........Rajas
Salt..........Tamas

The quality of Mercury is vital and reflective; it equates with the spiritual principles of goodness and intelligence; Sattva guna is illuminative.  The quality of Sulphur is fiery and passionate like the principles of Rajas, which incites desire, attachment and action.  The quality of Salt is arrestive and binding, and reflects the gross inertia of matter, which is much like Tamas.  These gunas and the three alchemical substances symbolize spirit, soul and body. Alchemy also speaks of a "secret fire", which is often compared to a serpent or dragon.  Here again, we find the correspondence to Kundalini, the serpent-power.

Alchemy has also been carried over into our modern psychology. 

Jung asserted that the medieval alchemists were unaware of the natural process of psychological transformation which went on in their subconscious.  Therefore, they projected this process into their experiments as a science of the soul.  In other words, they projected an inner process outside of themselves.

The study of alchemy can be relevant to our modern lives, even if we have a spiritual orientation.    In many metaphorical ways we are thinking like alchemists all the time.  Jung also observed that the dreams of his clients repeatedly stressed the main alchemical themes, especially the conflict and union of opposites.  One of the main symbols of reconciliation of this conflict are various mandala forms, present from alchemy to Tibetan Buddhism.  The alchemical symbolism is widespread in dreams of modern individuals, and can shed light on these more primitive aspects of our subconscious life.  It is important for our understanding of our own unconscious, and how it transcends and subverts us.  Plato enjoined us to "Know Thyself." 




 In Alchemical Active Imagination, vonFranz states,

"True knowledge of oneself is the knowledge of the objective psyche as it manifests in dreams and in the manifestations of the unconscious.  Only by looking at dreams, for instance, can one see who one truly is; they tell us who we really are, that is something which is objectively there.  To meditate on that is an effort towards self-knowledge, because that is scientific and objective and not in the interest of the ego but in the interest of "what I am" objectively.  It is knowledge of the Self, of the wider, objective personality."