le applying to it can be set
forth. Other reasons, e.g., intellectual and conventional ones, influenced
them to retain the symbolism.

Very clearly mystical are the writings of a number of hermetic artists,
who are permeated by the spiritual doctrine of Jacob Boehme. This
theosophist makes such full use of the alchemistic symbolism, that we find
it wherever we open his writings. I will not even begin to quote him, but
will only call the reader's attention to his brief and beautifully
thoughtful description of the mystical process of moral perfection, which
stands as "Processus" at the end of the 5th chapter of his book, "De
Signatura Rerum." (Ausg., Gichtel Col., 2218 f.)

An anonymous author who has absorbed much of the "Philosophicus
Teutonicus," wrote the book, "Amor Proximi," much valued by the amateurs
of the high art. It does not require great penetration to recognize this
pious manual, clothed throughout in alchemistic garments, as a mystical
work. The same is true of the formerly famous "Wasserstein der Weisen"
(1st ed. appeared 1619), and similar books. Here are some illustrative
pages from "Amor Proximi":

"This [Symbol: water] [[Symbol: water] of life] is now the creature not
foreign or external but most intimate in every one, although hidden....
See Christ is not outside of us, but intimately within us, although
hidden." (P. 32.)

"Whoever is to work out a thing practically must first have a fundamental
knowledge of a thing; in order that man shall macrocosmically and
magically work out the image of God, all God's kingdom, in himself; he
must have its right knowledge in himself...." (P. 29.)

"Christ is the great Universal; [The Grand Mastery is also called by the
alchemists the 'universal'; it tinctures all metals to gold and heals all
diseases (universal medicine); there is a somewhat more circumscribed
'particular,' which tinctures only a special metal and cures only single
diseases.] who says: 'Whoever will follow me and be my disciple (i.e., a
particular or member of my body), let him take up his [Symbol: cross] and
follow me.' Thus one sees that all who desire to be members of the great
universal must each partake according to the measure of his suffering and
development as small specific remedies." (Pp. 168 ff.)

"Paracelsus, the monarch of Arcana, says that the stars as well as the
light of grace, nowhere work more willingly than in a fasting, pure, and
free heart. As it is naturally true that