alled sun; but as all three are recognized as inseparably one, the
termini can change places until finally an inner illumination takes place.
"Those that have never had this experience are apt to decry it as
imaginary, but those who enter into it know that they have entered into a
higher life, or feel themselves enabled to look upon things from a higher
point of view. To use what may seem to be a misapplication of language: it
is a supernatural birth, naturally entered upon." (H. A., p. 229.) When
the alchemists speak of philosophical mercury and philosophical gold, they
mean something in man and something in God that finally turns out to be
the One. "By this symbolism the alchemists escape the difficulty of
treating the subject in ordinary language. The learner must always return
to nature and her possibilities for the sense of the derived symbols, and
to it the hermetic masters also continually direct him." (H. A., pp. 232
ff.) If the true light has risen in the hearts of the seekers, kindled
from within (although apparently by a miracle from without) "the sulphur
and mercury become one, or are seen to be the same, differing only in a
certain relation; somewhat as the known and the unknown (and the conscious
and the unconscious) are but one, the unknown decreasing as the known
increases, and vice versa." (H. A., p. 235.)

One alchemist teaches: "Consider well what it is you desire to produce,
and according to that regulate your intention. Take the last thing in your
intention as the first thing in your principles.... Attempt nothing out of
its own nature [then follow parables that grapes are not gathered from
thistles, etc.]. If you know how to apply this doctrine in your operation
as you ought, you will find great benefit, and a door will hereby be
opened to the discovery of greater mysteries." Actually there is a greater
difference between one who seeks what he seeks as an end, and one who
seeks it as a means to an end. To seek knowledge for riches is a very
different thing from seeking riches (or independence) as an instrument of
knowledge. In the study in question the means and the end must coincide,
i.e., the truth must be sought for itself only. (H. A., p. 238.) In the
book, "De Manna Benedicto," we read: "Whoever thou art that readest this
tractate, let me exhort thee that thou directest thy understanding and
soul more toward God for the keeping of his commandments, than toward love
of this art [sc. its external