"The central tenet of alchemy is that the cosmos is a unity of interdependent parts, that man is therefore connected to the cosmos, and that, if the nature of that connection or relationship can be found, it can be used to man's benefit. The nature of this relationship is assumed from the very start not to be physical, but one of sympathies and antipathies with the mystical reality that both underpins and surpasses the natural world. The physical universe is assumed to be entirely constrained by this mystical reality; thus, one can, with proper effort and scrutiny of the physical world, discover the nature of this mystical reality much as one can guess at the final form of a building by looking at its blueprints. (In the case of these cosmic blueprints, however, the "building" is the material world and the "blueprint" is the Immaterial -- making the "building" -- that is, the material world that has supposedly been built using the immaterial world as a "blueprint" -- of lesser quality and value than the blueprints themselves. Wierd.) In Alchemy, the very essence of man's sprirtual relationship with this mystical reality is written, if you will, into the physical substance of the universe, and by learning the properties, sympathies, affinities, qualities, and elemental nature of matter, one can thus learn the properties of the relationship of man to that mystical reality.

"But the relationship between the natural world and the mystical reality as perceived by alchemy is not passive, as is the relationship between a building and its blueprints, but active. Alchemy assumes that direct control and alteration of the physical world is necessary for any understanding of the relationship of man to the cosmos. (You gotta move the building stones around to uncover the blueprints, I guess.) Alchemy is thus an agressively transformative mysticism, rather than a passively contemplative one.

"But alchemy is not about transforming nature in order to understand nature, it is about transforming nature in order to understand how to transform man. An understanding of the precise chemical steps that transform base, "unripe" metals into gold is supposed to lead to an equal understanding of the precise philosophical steps required to transform man's body into the gold of perfect health and immortality and his soul into the spiritual gold of complete understanding of and perfect union with the mystical reality or, in some cases, with God.

"These relationships are presumed to be vastly, even infinitely complex, beyond the grasp of ordinary men and ordinary efforts, and perhaps beyond any man and any effort. Mistakes and errors are the accepted norm, and failure to produce gold is assumed to be as a result of defect of character, procedure, or materials, rather than a defect in the essential programme."