Philosopher's Stone

“ I stand forth to prove it, and how better can I prove it than by realizing the dream of the old transmuters of metals. Alikser is not a substance. The philosopher's stone is not a thing you can carry in your pocket. ”

“ That the undoubted truth in Natural Philosophy, is, in my opinion, like the Philosopher's Stone in Chymistry, which has been sought for by many learned and ingenious Persons, and will be sought as long as the Art of Chymistry doth last; but although they cannot find the Philosophers Stone, yet by the help of this Art they have found out many rare things both for use and knowledg. ”

“ His life had for years been devoted to one mystic search—the discovery of the philosopher's stone—and, like most of the enthusiasts in that wild pursuit, he firmly believed that every hour brought him nearer to an immortality upon earth, which in reality drew him closer and closer to the grave. ”

“ Who has not heard of the Philosopher's Stone, that much-coveted but unattainable red powder of the alchemists, which was supposed to possess the powers of transmuting baser metals into gold, of healing disease, and of restoring youth? Who has not read of those misguided men of former ages, whose lives were passed in attempting to discover this precious substance, which was to confer upon them inexhaustible wealth, health, and longevity, but whose labours too often resulted in poverty, sickness, and death? ”

“ There is a primeval light in which all stones are precious stones; a primeval darkness against which all flowers are as vivid as fireworks. Nevertheless, there is one kind of surprise that does surprise me, the more, perhaps, because it is not true surprise but a supercilious fuss. There is a kind of man who not only claims that his stone is the only pebble on the beach, but declares it must be the one and only philosopher’s stone, because he is the one and only philosopher. He does not discover suddenly the sensational fact that grass is green. ”

“ You are aware of how, in times past, men of absolutely no scientific insight held firmly to the idea that an elixir of life and a philosopher's stone might be discovered, and that these two objects were nearly always pursued contemporaneously. ”

“ Mediaeval superstition changed the human being who possessed such a power into the philosopher's stone—the stone which so many alchemists sought in the dark ages. But we of the nineteenth century have given back into human hands this power of transformation. ”

“ The scientist picks up a fragment of stone--the fool would fling it away with a laugh,--but the philosopher sees in it the genesis of a world; from it he can piece out the detailed history of ages; he finds in it, perchance, a fossil of the oldest organism, the first traces of that awful leap from matter to spirit, from dead earth to endless life; that marvel of marvels, that miracle of all miracles, by which dust and water and air live, breathe, think, reason, and cast their thoughts abroad through time and space and eternity. ”

“ This Virtue does indeed produce, in some measure, all those Effects which the Alchymist usually ascribes to what he calls the Philosopher's Stone; and if it does not bring Riches, it does the same thing, by banishing the De
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e of them. ”

“ Under the guidance of my new preceptors I entered with the greatest diligence into the search of the philosopher’s stone and the elixir of life; but the latter soon obtained my undivided attention. ”

“ In tracing the career of the erring philosophers, or the wilful cheats, who have encouraged or preyed upon the credulity of mankind, it will simplify and elucidate the subject, if we divide it into three classes: the first comprising alchymists, or those in general who have devoted themselves to the discovering of the philosopher's stone and the water of life ”

“ We are told that the Philosopher’s Stone, which would bring about the desired grand transmutation, is of a species with gold itself and purer than the purest; understood in the mystical sense this means that the regeneration of man can be effected only by Goodness itself—in terms of Christian theology, by the Power of the Spirit of Christ. ”

“ Such men therefore as these are (being stirr’d up by a singular candour and sincerity of mind to a love of honesty) doe not thrust themselves forward after the manner of impious and deceitfull Impostors and slanderous Vagrants that thirst after nothing but Gold, and pretend to some greedy Miser, that they will teach him the making of the Philosopher’s Stone (the knowledge of which themselves are clearly destitute of.) ”

“ And in the Chase of the Philosopher's Stone, they are so earnest, that they are scarce capable of any other Thoughts; so that if an Experiment lye ever so little out of their Road, it is free from their Discovery ”

“ It was generally believed that when this substance was found, it would have wonderful applications to human diseases and would transmute diseased tissues into healthy tissues in the same way that it transformed metals. It was felt that the philosopher's stone would be an elixir of life as well as a master of secrets for wealth. ”

“ Therefore the alchemist did not try to make something from nothing, but rather to extract and build that which already was, and this the student knows is the only possible course of procedure.
Man can create nothing from nothing, but he does contain within, in potential energy, all things; and like the alchemist with his metals, he is simply working with that which he already has. The living Philosopher’s Stone is a very beautiful thing. ”

“ There may be an indefinite distance between the "necessary truth" that two and two make four and the empirical truth that a stone will fall; but if all the evidence attainable goes to prove that the stone will fall, I should be as foolish not to act upon that hypothesis as not to assume the truth of the arithmetical formula. Now, it is, of course, the growth within recent generations of vast systems of such truths which has alarmed the philosopher. ”

“ To find the Philosophal Stone, is to have discovered the Absolute, as all the Masters say. But the Absolute is that which admits of no errors, is the Fixed from the Volatile, is the Law of the Imagination, is the very necessity of Being, is the immutable Law of Reason and Truth. ”

“ Therefore we have no reason to induce us to believe that the ancient Philosophers did in very deed describe or mean such a Stone as shines by night, but let us rather perswade our selves as being thereto constrained by the Verity of the thing, that they did not in the least mean a natural stone, but a stone prepared by Art, and their Tincture. ”

“ Every one of them is a relation to subjectivity, a result of impact on subjectivity, and is in the object only as reflecting or re-presenting there the sensuous nature of a subject. But these various "effects on various senses," these merely subjective separates—how do they get united into one thing? What constitutes the unity of sensuous manifolds? Every phenomenon being an essential plurality—a lot of "sense-effects"—what closes together the various effects on various human senses, called the properties of a stone, into the one phenomenal object, the stone itself. ”

“ There is no existence apart from attributes, no attributes but through relations, no relations but to other existences. To exemplify: a stone is heavy, hard, colored, perhaps bitter to the taste. Now, says the idealist, this weight, this hardness, this color, this bitterness, these are not the stone, they are merely its properties or attributes, and the stone itself is some substance behind them all, to which they adhere and which we cannot detect with our senses ”

“ The Philosophal Stone, say the Masters, must not be exposed to the atmosphere, nor to the gaze of the Profane; but it must be kept concealed and carefully preserved in the most secret place of the laboratory, and the possessor must always carry on his person the key of the place where it is kept. ”

“ In the last analysis of the monistic philosophy, there is but one substance and one quality in the universe. In the widest view of that philosophy, gold and oxygen and mercury and diamonds are one substance, and, if you please, one quality. But such refinements of analysis as this are for the transcendental philosopher, and not for the scientist. ”

“ And if the matter of the Philosophers Stone, and the manner of preparing it, be such Mysteries as they would have the World believe them, they may Write Intelligibly and Clearly of the Principles of mixt Bodies in General, without Discovering what they call the Great Work. ”

“ There is, therefore, a powerful and intelligent being who has always acted; and if this being had not acted, of what use to him would have been his existence? All things are, therefore, emanations from this first cause. But how can we imagine that stone and clay may be emanations of the eternal, intelligent, and puissant being? Of two things, one must be; either that the matter of this stone and mine necessarily exists of itself, or that it exists necessarily by this first cause; there is no medium. ”

“ The real man of science, like the philosopher, soon comes to seek truth and knowledge for their own sake. In art, in science, in philosophy, there come eventually the same detachment from personal desire and practical reaction; and to artist, man of science, and philosopher alike, through this detachment there comes at times the same peace that passeth all understanding. ”

“ As it posits itself, so it is, and as it is, so it posits itself; therefore the I is absolutely and necessarily for itself. The stone has an existence for us; we recognize it, and say, There is a stone. ”

“ Whoso clearly appreciates all that is implied in the falling of a stone can have no difficulty about any doctrine simply on account of its marvellousness. But the longer I live, the more obvious it is to me that the most sacred act of a man's life is to say and to feel, "I believe such and such to be true." ”

“ With his extravagant animation of all things, with his plant, stone, and star souls, he can help us to prove that the general nature of that particle of soul which is called reason, intellect, spirit, or understanding, is not so extraordinarily different from the general nature of stones or trees as the old time idealists and materialists were wont to think. ”

“ It is indeed very natural to ascribe spatial parts to a stone, for the reason that a stone is an instance of a perceptual object. These objects are the objects of common life, and it is very difficult precisely to discern such an object in the events with which it has its most obvious relations. The struggle to make precise the concept of these objects either forces us back to the sense-objects or forward to the scientific objects. The difficulty is chiefly one of making thought clear. That there is a perception of an object with self-identity, is shown by the common usage of mankind. ”

“ The shape, we should say, would disappear with the disappearance of the stone, but would not disappear with the disappearance of the mind which perceives the stone. Again, we should assert that the stone itself, so far from depending on the mind which perceives it, has an independent being of its own. ”

“ A little stone, a clod of earth, a movement in the nick of time—these are sometimes the only things which lie between one and the great Unknown, and hinder one from prematurely solving the mysterious problem of existence. ”

“ It is the sole edifice of true philosophy, the corner-stone of which was laid at Creation, when God said, “Let there be light; and there was light.” The scaffolding which our modern Prometheus has built is not the airy fabric of delusion, nor the baser fabric of a fraud, as has been so often asserted. It has been built plank by plank, upon firm ground, and every plank is of pure gold, as will be seen in due time.
It has been justly said that we have no ground for assuming that we have approached a limit in the field of discovery, or for claiming finality in our interpretations of Nature. ”

“ For if the Stone does not presently come forth, and make them masters of what they desire, away they throw their Books and tread upon them, and load the Authours with curses and imprecations, accusing them of wicked deceit, in that they have not written clear enough for every one to understand so great an Art at the very first dash, and to become a master of such a notable treasure without any labour at all. ”

“ But the question here must necessarily refer either to things or the forms of things; but the things themselves they cannot be, as it is not a stone but the form of a stone which is in the Vital Principle. ”

“ The mental image does not leap from the mind upon the stone and transform it magically into its own likeness. The external thing, the stone, offers resistance, and the resistance limits the artist’s effort. ”