Treatise also known as the Universal Key, in which one will find clearly indicated all that is necessary to perfect the Great Work.
We have called this work Clavicle, because without it it is impossible to understand our other books, the whole of which embraces the entire Art, because our words are obscure to the ignorant.
I have made many treatises, very extensive, but divided and obscure, as may be seen by the Testament, where I speak of the principles of nature and all that relates to art, but the text has been subjected to the hammer of Philosophy. The same goes for my book Mercury of the Philosophers, in the second chapter: on the fecundity of physical mines, the same for my book on the Quintessence of gold and silver, the same finally for all my other works where the art is treated in a complete way, except that I have always hidden the main secret. Now, without this secret no one can enter into the mines of the philosophers and do anything useful, this is why with the help and the permission of the Most High, to whom it has pleased to reveal to me the Great Work, I will treat here of Art without any fiction. But beware of revealing this secret to the wicked; Communicate it only to your intimate friends, although you should not reveal it to anyone, because it is a gift from God who makes it present to whoever seems good to him. Whoever owns it, will have one. eternal treasure.
Learn then to purify the perfect by the imperfect. The Sun is the father of all metals and the Moon is their mother, although the Moon receives its light from the Sun. On these two planets depends the whole magisterium.
According to Avicenna, metals can only be transmuted after being brought back to their raw material, which is true. You must therefore first reduce the metals to Mercury; but I do not mean here the vulgar, volatile Mercury, I speak of the fixed Mercury; for vulgar mercury is volatile, full of a phlegmatic coldness, it is essential that it be reduced by the fixed Mercury, hotter, drier, endowed with qualities contrary to those of vulgar mercury.
This is why I advise you, my friends, to operate on the Sun and the Moon only after having brought them back to their raw material which is the sulfur and the Mercury of the philosophers.
O my children, learn to use this venerable material, for I warn you under the faith of the oath, if you do not draw Mercury from these two metals, you will work like blind men, in darkness and in doubt. This is why, O my sons, I conjure you to walk towards the light, with your eyes open and not to fall blind into the abyss of perdition.
DIFFERENCES OF VULGAR MERCURY AND PHYSICAL MERCURY.
We say: common mercury cannot be the Mercury of the Philosophers, by whatever artifice it has been prepared; for ordinary mercury can only stand fire with the aid of a foreign corporeal Mercury which is hot, dry, and more digested than itself. This is why I say that our physical Mercury is of a hotter and more fixed nature than ordinary Mercury. Our corporeal Mercury is converted into flowing Mercury, not wetting the fingers; when it is joined to the vulgar mercury, they unite and join so well with the help of a bond of love, that it is impossible to separate them from each other, even from the water mixed with water. Such is the law of nature. Our Mercury penetrates the vulgar Mercury and mingles with it, drying up its phlegmatic humidity, taking away its coldness, which makes it black as coal and finally causes it to crumble into dust.
Note well that the vulgar Mercury cannot be employed in place of our physical Mercury, which possesses the natural heat in the desired degree; it is even for this reason that our Mercury communicates its own nature to ordinary Mercury. Much more, our Mercury, after its transmutation, changes the metals into pure metal, that is to say into the Sun and the Moon, as we demonstrated in the second part of our Practice. But he does something even more remarkable, he changes vulgar mercury into Medicine which can transmute imperfect metals into perfect ones. He changes vulgar mercury into true Sun and true Moon, better than those which come out of the mine. Note also that our physical Mercury can transmute a hundred marcs and more, to infinity, all that we have, of ordinary mercury, unless it runs out.
I also want you to know something else, Mercury does not mix easily and never perfectly with other bodies, if these have not previously been brought back to its natural kind. This is why when you want to unite Mercury with the Sun or the Moon of the vulgar, you will first have to bring these metals back to their natural species which is ordinary mercury, using the bond of natural love; then the male unites with the female. So our Mercury is active, hot and dry, while the common Mercury is cold, damp, passive like the female who is kept at home in temperate heat until clouding. Then these two mercurys become black as coal; this is the secret of true dissolution. Then they join together in such a way that it becomes impossible to ever separate them. They then appear in the form of a very white powder, and they engender male and female children by the true en of love. These children will multiply ad infinitum according to their kind; because of an ounce of this powder, powder of projection, white or red elixir, you will make Suns in infinite number and you will transmute in Moon any species of metal left from a mine.
EXTRACTION OF MERCURY FROM THE PERFECT BODY.
Take an ounce of cupelled Moonlime, calcine it as described at the end of our work on the Magisterium. This lime will then be reduced to a fine powder on a porphyry plate. Thou shalt imbibe this powder two, three, four times a day with good oil of tartar prepared in the manner described at the end of this work; then you will dry it in the sun. You will continue thus until the said lime has absorbed four or five parts of oil, the quantity of lime being taken as unity; you will pulverize the powder on the porphyry as it was said, after having dried it, because then it is reduced more easily to powder. When it will have been well porphyrized, it will be introduced into a matrass with a long neck. You will add to it our stinking menstruation made with two parts of red vitriol and one part of saltpetre; you will have previously distilled this menstruation seven times and you will have rectified it well by separating it from its earthy impurities, so that in the end this menstruation will be completely essential.
Then we will lute the matrass perfectly, we will put it on the fire of ashes, with some coals, until we see the matter boiling and dissolving. Finally we will distill on the ashes until all the menses has passed and we will wait until the material is cold. When the vase is completely cooled, it will be opened, and the matter will be placed in another very clean vase equipped with its perfectly lute capital. We will place everything on ashes in a furnace. The lut being dry, one will first heat gently until all the water of the matter on which one operates has passed into the container. Then the fire is increased to completely dry out the material and exalt the stinking spirits which will pass into the capital and from there into the container. When you see the operation come to this point, you will let the ship cool down by gradually decreasing the fire. The vase being cold, you will withdraw the material from it which you will reduce to a subtle powder on the porphyry. You will put the impalpable powder thus obtained in a well-fired and well-vitrified earthenware vase. Then pour plain boiling water over it, stirring with a clean stick, until the mixture is thick like mustard. Stir well with the rod until you see a few globules of mercury appear in the material; there will soon be quite a large quantity of them according to what you have used of the perfect body, that is to say of the Moon. And until you have a large quantity, pour boiling water from time to time and stir until all the matter is reduced to a body similar to vulgar mercury. We will remove the earthy impurities with cold water, we will dry on a cloth, we will pass through a chamois leather. And then you will see wonderful things.
OF THE MULTIPLICATION OF OUR MERCURY. I
In the name of the Lord. Amen.
Take three large Pure Moon in thin strips; make an amalgam of it with four large well-washed common mercury. When the amalgam is made you will put it in a small matrass having a neck of a foot and a half.
Then take our Mercury extracted above from the lunar body, and put it on the amalgam made with the perfect body and the vulgar mercury; lut the vase with the best lut possible and let it dry. This done, shake the matrass vigorously to mix the amalgam and the mercury well. Then place the vase where the material is in a small furnace on a fire of only a few coals; the heat of the fire must not be greater than that of the sun when it is in the sign of the lion. A stronger heat would destroy your material; so continue this degree of fire until the matter becomes black as coal and thick as mush. Maintain the same temperature until the material takes on a dark gray color; when the gray appears, the fire will be increased by one degree and it will be twice as strong; it will be maintained in this way until the material begins to whiten and becomes dazzlingly white. The fire will be increased by one degree and this third degree will be maintained until the matter becomes whiter than snow and is reduced to powder whiter and purer than ashes. You will then have the Philosophers' quicklime and its sulphurous ore that the Philosophers have hidden so well.
PROPERTY OF PHILOSOPHERS' LIME.
This Lime converts an infinite quantity of vulgar mercury into a very white powder which can be reduced to real silver when united with some other body like the Moon.
MULTIPLICATION OF THE LIME OF THE PHILOSOPHERS.
Take the vessel with the material, add to it two ounces of well-washed and dry common mercury; read carefully, and put the vessel back where it was first. Regulate and govern the fire according to degrees one, two and three as above, until the whole is reduced to a very white powder; you can thus increase your Lime to infinity.
REDUCTION OF QUICKLIME IN REAL MOON.
Having therefore prepared a large quantity of our quicklime or mining lime, take a new crucible without its lid; put in it an ounce of pure Moon, and when it is melted, add four ounces of your agglomerated powder into pills. These little balls each weigh a quarter of an ounce. They are thrown one by one on the molten Moon, while continuing a violent fire until all the pills are melted; increase the heat even more so that everything mixes perfectly; finally we will pour in an ingot mold.
You will thus have five ounces of fine silver, purer than natural; you can multiply your physical mining as you wish.
OF OUR GREAT WORK IN WHITE AND RED.
Reduce to Mercury, as was said above, your quicklime drawn from the Moon. This is our secret Mercury. So take four ounces of our lime, extract the Mercury from the Moon as you did above. You will collect at least three ounces of Mercury which you will put in a small matrass with a long neck as it has been said. Then make an amalgam of one ounce of true Sun with three ounces of vulgar mercury and put it on the Mercury of the Moon. Shake vigorously to mix well. Fire the vessel carefully and put it in the furnace, adjusting the fire to the first, second and third degree.
In the first degree, matter will turn black like coal; we then say that there is an eclipse of the Sun and the Moon. It is the true conjunction that produces a child, Sulphur, full of temperate blood.
After this first operation, we continue with the fire of the second degree until the matter is gray. Then we pass to the third degree until the moment the matter appears perfectly white. The fire is then increased until the material turns red like cinnabar and is reduced to red ashes. You can reduce this Lime to very pure Sun, by doing the same operations as for the Moon.
HOW TO CHANGE THE ABOVE STONE INTO A MEDICINE WHICH TRANSMUTES ALL KINDS OF METAL INTO TRUE SUN AND TRUE MOON AND ESPECIALLY THE VULGAR MERCURY EK METAL PURESTER THAN THAT WHICH COMES FROM THE MINES.
After its first resolution our Stone multiplies one hundred parts of prepared matter, and after the second, one thousand. We multiply by dissolving, coagulating, sublimating, fixing our matter which can thus increase indefinitely in quantity and quality.
So take some of our white mineral, dissolve it in our stinking menstruation, which is called white vinegar in our Testament, in the chapter where we say: "Take very dry boa vin, put the Moon in it, that is say green water and C, that is to say saltpeter.... “But let’s not get lost; take four ounces of our Quicklime and dissolve in our menses, you will see it resolve into green water. On the other hand, in thirteen ounces of this same stinking menstruation, you will dissolve four ounces of well-washed vulgar mercury, and as soon as the dissolution is complete, you will mix the two solutions; put them in a well-sealed vessel, digest them in horse manure for thirty days, then distill in a bain-marie until nothing passes through. Redistill over a charcoal fire to extract the oil and then the material that remains will be black. Take this and distill for two hours over the ashes in a small furnace. The vase being cold, open it and pour into it the water which was distilled above in a bain-marie. Wash the material well with this water. Then distill the menses in a bain-marie; collect all the water which will pass, join it to the oil and distil on the ashes, as it has been said. Repeat this operation until the material remains at the bottom of the vessel, black as coal. Son of science, you will then have the Raven's Head that the Philosophers have sought so much, without which the Magisterium cannot exist. Therefore, O my Son, remember the divine Supper of Our Lord Jesus Christ who died, was buried, and on the third day came to light on the eternal earth. Know well, O my Son, that no being can live if he is not dead first. So take your black body, calcine it in the same vessel for three Days, then let it cool.
Open it and you will find a spongy and dead earth, which you will keep until it is necessary to unite the body to the soul.
You will take the water that has been distilled in a water bath, you will distill it several times in succession, until it is well purified and reduced to a crystalline substance.
Soak up your body which is the Black Earth with its own water, watering it little by little and heating everything, until the body becomes white and resplendent. The water that vivifies and clarifies has penetrated the body. The vessel having been fought, you will heat up violently for twelve hours, as if you wanted to sublimate the vulgar mercury. The vase having cooled, you will open it and you will find there your sublimated matter, white, it is our Sigillated Earth, it is our sublimated body, raised to a high dignity, it is our Sulphur, our Mercury, our Arsenic, with which you will warm our Gold, is our leaven, our quicklime and it engenders in itself the Son of Fire which is the Love of the philosophers.
MULTIPLICATION OF THE ABOVE SULFUR.
Put this material in a strong matrass and pour over it an amalgam made with quicklime from the first operation, the one we were reducing to silver. This amalgam is made with three parts of common mercury and one part of our Lime; you will mix and you will heat on the ashes. You will see the material stir, then increase the heat and in four hours the material will become sulphurous and very white. When it has been fixed, it will coagulate and fix Mercury; one ounce of matter will change one hundred ounces of Mercury into true Medicine; it will then operate on a thousand ounces, and so on ad infinitum.
FIXING MULTIPLE SULFUR.
One will take the multiplied sulfur, one will place it in a matrass and one will pour over the oil which had been put aside during the separation of the elements.
Oil will be poured in until the Sulfur is soft. Then we will melt on the ashes, heating to the second and third degree, until the whiteness inclusively. Then we will open the vessel and we will find a crystalline, white plate. To try it, put a fragment of it on a hot plate, and if it flows without producing smoke, it is good. So throw one part of it out of a thousand mercury and it will be completely transmuted into silver. But if the medicine had been infusible and had not flowed, put it in a crucible and pour oil over it, drop by drop, until the medicine flows like wax, and then it will be perfect. and will transmute a thousand parts of mercury and more ad infinitum.
REDUCTION OF BLASCHE MEDICINE IN RED ELIXIR.
In the name of the Lord, take four ounces of the aforesaid blade and dissolve it in the Water of the Stone, which you have kept. When the dissolution is complete, put it to ferment in a bain-marie for nine days. Then take two parts by weight of our Red Lime and add them to the vessel, you will ferment again for nine days. Then you will distill in a bain-marie in a still, then on the ashes, adjusting the fire to the first degree until the moment when the matter turns black. This is our second dissolution and our second eclipse of the Sun with the Moon, this is the sign of the true dissolution and conjunction of the male with the female.
Increase the fire to the second degree, so that the matter becomes yellow. Then the fire will be raised to the fourth degree until the matter melts like wax and is of a hyacinth color. It is then a noble material and a royal medicine which quickly cures all diseases; it transmutes every kind of metal into pure gold better than natural gold.
Now let us give thanks to the glorious Savior who in the glory of heaven reigns one and three in eternity.
MAGISTERIUM SUMMARY.
We have demonstrated that everything contained in this treaty is true, because we have seen with our own eyes, we have operated ourselves, we have touched with our own hands. Now we will without allegories and briefly summarize our Work. So we take the Stone that we have said, we sublimate it with the help of nature and art, we reduce it to Mercury. To this Mercury we add the White Body which is of a similar nature, and we cook until we have prepared the true mineral.
This mining will multiply at your will. Matter will again be reduced to Mercury, which you will dissolve in our Menses until the Stone becomes volatile and separated from all its elements. Finally, body and soul will be perfectly purified. A natural and moderate heat will then make it possible to make a success of the conjunction of the body and the heart. The Stone will become a mine; we will continue the fire until the matter becomes white, we then call it Sulfur and Mercury of the Philosophers; it is then that by the violence of the fire, the fixed becomes volatile, inasmuch as the volatile will have rid itself of its gross principles and will have sublimated itself whiter than snow. We'll throw what's left at the bottom of the ship, because it's good for nothing. Then take our Sulfur, which is the oil already mentioned, and multiply it in the still until it is reduced to a powder whiter than snow. One will fix the powders multiplied by nature and by art, with Water, until when tested by fire, they flow without smoke like wax.
It is then necessary to add the water of the first solution; everything having dissolved, we will put something yellow which is gold, we will unite and distill all the spirit. Finally, we will heat to the first, second, third and fourth degree until the heat causes the true hyacinth color to appear, and the fixed matter is fusible. You will project this matter on a thousand parts of vulgar mercury and it will be transmuted into fine gold.
CALCINATION OF THE MOON FOR THE WORK.
Take one ounce of Fine Cupped Moon and three ounces of Mercury. Amalgamate, by first heating the silver in strips in a crucible and then adding the mercury; stir with a chopstick, while continuing to heat through. Then put this amalgam in vinegar with salt; we will grind everything with a pestle in a wooden mortar, while washing and removing the impurities. We'll stop when the mix is perfect. Then we will wash with ordinary hot and clear water, then we will pass through a very clean cloth.
What remains on the linen being the most essential part of the body, one will mix it with three parts of salt, grinding well and washing. Finally, we will calcine for twelve hours. We will begin again to grind with salt, and this three times, each time renewing the salt. Then we will pulverize the material so as to obtain an impalpable powder; wash in hot water until all salty flavor is gone. Finally we will pass through a cotton filter, we will dry out, and we will have the white lime. We'll put it in reserve, for some. serve when needed, lest the humidity spoil it.
PROCEDURE FOR. PREPARE THE OIL OF TARTAR.
Take some good tartar, the fracture of which is brilliant, calcine it in the reverberatory furnace for ten hours; then you will put it on a marble slab after having pulverized it and you will leave it in a humid place, it will dissolve into an oily liquid. When it is completely liquefied, it will be passed through a cotton filter. You will keep it carefully, it will be used to soak your lime.
STINKY MENSTRUE TO REDUCE OUR QUICKLIME INTO MERCURY, AFTER HAVING DISSOLVED IT WHEN IT HAS ALREADY BEEN SOAKED IN OIL OF TARTAR.
Take two pounds of vitriol, one pound of saltpetre, and three ounces of cinnabar. We redden the vitriol, we pulverize it, then we add the saltpeter and the cinnabar, we grind all these materials together, and we put in a well-lit distilling apparatus.
We first distil over a slow fire, it is absolutely necessary, as those who have done this operation know. This water will distill leaving its impurities which will remain at the bottom of the curcurbite and you will thus have this excellent period.
ANOTHER MENSTRUE TO SERVE AS A SOLVENT FOR THE STONE.
Take three pounds of red Roman vitriol, one pound of saltpetre, three ounces of cinnabar, grind all these materials together on the marble. Then put them in a large and solid matrass, add seven times rectified brandy, then seal the vessel perfectly and put it for fifteen days in horse manure. Then we will gently distill so that all the water passes into the container. Then the fire will be increased until the capital is brought to white; then let cool. We will remove the container that we will close perfectly with wax and we will keep it. Notice that this menstruation has to be rectified Seven times, throwing off the residue each time. Only then will he be good for the work.
END
Quote of the Day
“It is necessary therefore, to dissolve and liquefy these bodies by our water, and to make them a permanent or fixed water, a pure, golden water leaving in the bottom the gross, earthy, superfluous and dry matter. And in this subliming, making thin and pure, the fire ought to be gentle; but if in this subliming with soft fire, the bodies be not purified, and the gross and earthy parts thereof (note this well) be not separated from the impurities of the dead, you shall not be able to perfect the work. For thou needest nothing but the thin and subtile part of the dissolved bodies, which our water will give thee, if thou proceedest with a slow or gentle fire, by separating the things heterogene from the things homogene.”
Artephius
The Secret Book of Artephius
Alchemical Books
Audio Books
Total visits