Alchemy texts archives - Fulcanelli

Date: Sun, 10 May 1998
From: Mateus Nicolau Carneiro Cunha

Dear members of the forum,
As I was reading just now an article on Fulcanelli in the back issues of the Hermetic Journal, I was struck by the fact that Canseliet's Master, Vulcan-Helios/Fulcanelli/Julien Champagne, had supposedly left a third book to be printed but then changed his mind: the book was to be called Finis Gloriae Mundi...

When René Alleau published his alchemical masterpiece, 'Aspects de l'Alchimie Traditionelle', ed Minuit, he placed a very enigmatic painting on the cover, in a style reminiscent of El Greco and which included two coffins, a balance, and the motto: Finis Gloriae Mundi. The book deals extensively with the Samothracian Mystery Deities, i.e. the Kabiri, whose connections with Vulcan and Metallurgy are well known (vide Eliade, The Forge and the Crucible).

To make a long story short, is Alleau's book to be taken for the supposed unpublished third book that was written by Fulcanelli? Is it a substitute? This is NOT a literal question, but one that concerns the ESSENCE of a tradition/transmission.

All the best,

Mateus

From: Marcella Gillick
Date: Mon, 25 May 1998

Finally, at long last, got my hands on a copy of Le Mystere des Cathedrales Apart from the sound advice that I should find out for myself, could anybody explain to me what Canseliet referred to in the following extract of his preface (his italics are typed as capitals):-

'' I know, not from having discovered it myself, but because I was assured of it by the author more than ten years ago, that the KEY TO THE MAJOR ARCANUM IS GIVEN quite openly in one of the figures illustrating the present work. And this key consists quite simply in A COLOUR revealed to the artisan right from the first work. No Philosopher, to my knowledge, has emphasized the importance of this essential point. In revealing it, I am obeying the last wishes of Fulcanelli and my conscience is clear. ''

And also, who are the Brothers of Heliopolis?
Many thanks in advance
Marcella

Date: Tue, 26 May 1998
From: mike dickman

Marcella

(Hi, by the way)... Here's what Fulcanelli himself says on colour from pp. 113-114 of the French edition of the same volume, bringing to conclusion a lengthy dissertation on same (excuse the translation):

'...Similarly, your stone needs nourishment to increase its strength, and such nourishment should be graded, that is to say changed at certain stages. First give it milk; follow this with a more substantial diet of meat. And do not fail, after each digestion, to separate out the excrement by which your stone might otherwise become infected... Follow nature, then, and obey it as faithfully as you can. And when your knowledge of the Regime has become perfect you will understand how to effect the coction. Thus will you better grasp the stern apostrophe addressed by Tolius (cf. J. Tolius 'Le Chemin du Ciel Chymique' transl. from 'Manuductio ad Coelum Chemicum', Amstelaedami, Janss. Waesburgios, 1688) to those slaves of the letter, the puffers: "Go, and betake yourselves off presently, ye who seeek with extreme application your colours diverse in your vessels of glass. You who weary my ears with your black crow, are as mad as that antique fellow who made custom to applaud in theatre, albeit he was alone, for belief that he had always before his eyes some new spectacle or play. And just so do you, when, weeping tears of joy, you imagine that within your jars you do descry your white dove, yellow eagle, and red pheasant! Go, I tell you, and betake yourselves far from me, if you would seek the stone of the wise in some thing fixed; for it shall no more penetrate bodies metallic than will the body of a man the solidity of a wall...
"So for what I have to say to you concerning colour, that you quit henceforth your useless travail; to the which shall I add a word touching on smell.
"Earth is black, Water white; the closer cometh Air unto the Sun, the more is it yellow; the Aethyr is of red entire. Death also, it is said, is black, life full of light; the purer that light, the closer its approach unto the nature angelic, and angels are spirits of pure fire. Now, is not the odour of a corpse displeasing and obnoxious to the sense of smell? Thus, a stinking odour, among Philosophers, denoteth fixation; and, the contrary, a pleasing smell marks volatility, in that it approacheth unto life and to warmth."...' (PP.88-89 in the Neville Spearman ed.)

Hope this is of at least SOME help (!)... I'm told that the whole thing is in Champagne's frontispiece.

m

Date: Tue, 26 May 1998
From: mike dickman

Also worth a look as a sort of summary of much of the Fulcanelli stuff on colour and the Prima materia, try 'The Colours to be observed in the Great Work' on Adam's website.

m

From: Marcella Gillick
Date: Thu, 28 May 1998

Mike Dickman wrote:
> I'm told that the whole thing is in Champagne's frontispiece.

Failte Mike, thanks for taking the time, and for the information. The frontispiece in my copy (Brotherhood of Life) is entitled ''The sphinx protects and controls science''. I'm curious about this pointer as a friend just wrote me the following:-

> One time he told me that the entire secret was in one of the Plates > in Le Mystere des Cathedrales. He then showed me plate XXXI > Symbolic Coat of Arms (XIIIth Century). At the time I took it to > mean the secret to accomplishing the Great Work but it may be the > answer to your question - might even be both. Unfortunately my > copy is only a greyscale and not a colour copy as it was in his book. > He did indicate that the colour was important to me.

Best wishes
Marcella

From: Jerry Bujas
Date: Thu, 28 May 1998

Marcella Gillick wrote:

>And this key consists quite
>simply in A COLOUR revealed to the artisan right from the first work.

What about the color black, meaning darkness, as the stars around the Sphinx seem to suggest. In some other place, Fulcanelli affirms that we should begin work in complete absence of light.

Do then white and red mean lunar and solar light....?

Jerry Bujas

From: Marcella Gillick
Date: Fri, 29 May 1998

Jerry Bujas says:
> What about the color black, meaning darkness, as the stars around
> the Sphinx seem to suggest. In some other place, Fulcanelli
> affirms that we should begin work in complete absence of light.
> Do then white and red mean lunar and solar light....?

I'm only a little way through this book yet, but already have encountered so many references to different colours! (I have been offered colour copies of the two plates which Champagne drew, which I will post to the forum if requested - or to Adam for the web if he wishes?)

Actually, I have been rereading previous related messages to the Forum, and one dated Fri 19 Dec'97 from AMW House, entitled ''Fulcanelli and deLubicz'' seems to favour Indigo, which I want to pursue since its my favourite! Here is an extract from his long post:-

>(snip)..... > COLOR
> THEORY Purloined Fulcanelli mss. about color theory concerning indigo,
> the prismatic entity central to the entire color - language. Albertus
> on indigo. Alchemist's Handbook. The postulation of seven prismatic
> colors, three primary and three secondary, leaves one INDIGO to be
> classified by itself. This classification is purely physical, as light
> waves can be measured and even their physical origin can be determined
> by spectro-analysis. Yet all seven analyzed colors are the product of a
> single ray of so called white light penetrating the prism. Now
> alchemists have an answer for a similar problem concerning metals by
> explaining that there are also seven primary metals; namely gold,
> silver, copper, tin, iron, lead, and mercury. Paracelsus discovered
> zinc, a solid metal comparable to the unstable Hg. Mercury, although a
> metal, is not of the same malleable nature as the first six metals. In
> a like manner, Indigo, in the prismatic color scheme, is not one of the
> three primary or three secondary colors, but represents a seventh
> factor, separate from the others. Indigo, has a bluish mixed tint, just
> as mercury has a silvery appearance, yet neither one is what its
> apparent color indicates. Indigo is not blue, nor is mercury
> (quicksilver) silver. If all colors can be produced from white light,
> then it is possible to reduce them again into white light. What
> Indigo's place may be in this schematic arrangement has not yet been
> satisfactorily answered, but it is my hypothesis that it is the Agent
> to dispel (scatter) and to reorganize the different vibrations of
> color, similar to the role played by quicksilver among the metals.
> Metals are of similar origin. All seven primary of one nature, just as
> the seven prismatic colors are drawn from a single beam of white light.
> If the origin of the prime metals has not been solved, it is due to the
> reluctance of science to accept the findings of the alchemists. Newton
> tried without success to win acceptance of his theory of light.
> Paracelsus and others also tried in vain to interest science in their
> findings, only to be confronted by the unseeing eye and the deaf ear of
> prejudice. Philosopher's mercury is the source of all seven primary
> metals, as, in like manner, white light is the source of the seven
> prismatic colors. Indigo is Indigo To arrange the prismatic colors
> along the lines of principles and elements, makes one ready for the
> laboratory. Key: Prismatic spectrum according to Newton. Triangular
> form decomposing unitary white light by this dispersion into the seven
> primary prismatic colors: Red orange yellow green blue indigo violet
> The man who wrote the small m.s.s. that Fulcanelli stole worked on an
> alteration of form through salt and he noted it down in terms of the
> blue-indigo-violet imbroglio. This creates an inevitable irregularity
> that occurs at the end of one octave and the beginning of the next. The
> same irregularity occurs in the musical octave (the Diabalos in Musica)
> and in the planetary system. This is where the effort has to play -
> where the violet turns to ultraviolet and disappears for our vision.
> This is where the adept attempts to join the end to the beginning -
> have the beast bite its tail. Here is where a new red can be born, the
> red beyond violet, the one that is felt in violet and disappears into
> ultraviolet The idea may sound strange, yet when applied to the
> water-salt-earth complex, it makes marvelous sense. Just as indigo and
> blue do not give violet, so earth and water alone do not possess the
> qualities to form the salt we are looking for, the fixed salt of
> permanence, which is an effect of spirit of perception. It is the
> understanding through the organ of harmony. With this instrumentation
> we are capable of acting on the salt of nature. The formal element can
> be and must be manipulated. Fire and water must be made to join, and
> this can only effectuated through the fire of the earth. The fire of
> the earth must be bound to water. The important lesson here is the use
> of the earth-fire to accomplish the fire-water combination, the seal of
> Sal-Amon. Indigo must be shifted to blue and become one of the
> components of violet. We are merely preparing a milieu for a new
> redness to become visible. Metallic forms are what we're working on,
> substances we know in their relation to color, not only by their lines
> in spectroscopy, but by other more intuitive ways. (clairvoyance?) The
> result is captured in glass, and here comes the difficult manipulation
> of the decantations which Canselliet's letter (intro to Le Mystere des
> Cathedrales) talks about. The end result will be a glass that is red in
> the mass without being pigmented. We prepared the milieu for the
> phenomenon to happen, but the new octave will be attracted to the
> prepared milieu. Spirit has to be caught in the net, as the Pharaonics
> say. (notice the language reveals a weave pattern, cubic crystalline
> structure is criss crossed). The well established trinity of red,
> yellow, blue, is changed to a quartet, which now includes Indigo. Where
> this leads us: The composed colors have become principial trinity,
> whereas, the fundamental colors have become the four elements.

best wishes
Marcella

Date: Fri, 05 Jun 1998
From: mike dickman

Has anyone ever seen the frontispiece to Fulcanellies 'Mystčre des Cathédrales' in colour? Is there access to same?

m