Dew. But I guess it might be mostly symbolic; alchemists are known for speaking only through symbols and similes. In fact, their dew can even be the part that sublimated into vapors in the vessel, which then settles to the bottom as apparent dew or drizzle. Instead, when they speak of the true dew of the month of May, they disguise it under the definition of “their” Philosophical Spring.
I’ll answer you with a question: why is everything you’ve listed called dew?
I don’t know, I guess because it falls…
It is not just a matter of falling, but of flowing from above. It could be a symbolic “fall” of a substance that symbolically “flows” from a symbolic “height” or sky. The alchemists could have called the thing drizzle or even rain, which better conveyed the idea of falling. However, they never put dew and drizzle in the same sentence.
I quote (actually, from AI): “The embodiment of the Spirit of the World, Spiritus Mundi, called “the gathering of the dew”, has always been the ultimate goal of alchemical labors. The result, properly prepared, is traditionally called the Philosophers’ Stone. The set of operations to achieve it, the delicate cooking of the R+C, the “brothers of the Cooked Dew”, is called the Great Work”.
Even this definition is highly symbolic. In reality, if an alchemist followed this “recipe” to the letter, he would only obtain a spagyric phytomedicine. Anyway, there is something useful in that: The Spiritus Mundi tends to hover in the air during the day, but at night, with the help of the moon, it falls on the Earth’s crust and in its most hidden recesses.
So something falls!
No, the nocturnal fall is only symbolic, in reality the correct term is “becoming body” or “entering the body”.
It enters a body just like magic, did I understand correctly?
It’s not magic, but contact. Alchemists define the whole sequence as a “density scale”. And, I add, it’s a contact scale. All alchemical operations are based on this contact scale. Because, for the ancients, the void did not exist but a continuum, so dense that they imagined it could be cut with a knife. This scale is so complex that it is best not to go into details for now.
I would like to know if the fourth table of the Mutus Liber should be taken literally, that is, as an authentic collection of the moisture common in the fields through sheets spread and then wrung out. Is there a much less laborious method for obtaining the Philosophers’ Dew?
This is not the question you should be asking me right now. You still don’t understand the difference between common dew and philosophers’ dew. Actually, I’m using the wrong terms, because it’s not a matter of differences between the two, but of analogies and similarities. Alchemy is not an art of exceptions, but of analogies and commonalities; otherwise, all these different methods of alchemical work would not be possible. The humid path, the dry path, the metallurgical path, the path of wine, of earth, of manure, of urine, of vitriol, of sulfides, of marine salt and vinegar, of gold, of benzoin and myrrh, and, of course, also of dew.
From what I understand, it is about gathering the Spiritus Mundi in it.
Gathering or collecting? I say this, because there is a substantial difference between the two. But it’s not the time to talk about that now. Instead, let’s go back to the beginning. Why, after having spoken of the fusion of metals, did I invite you to understand dew? The whole thing lies in understanding what happens at the dew point. Not only that, but also what commonly happens in the “dew hour”.
Let’s start with what seems most intuitive: what usually happens during the dew hour?
The dew hour is the moment when the sun begins to emerge from the darkness. In fact, the night is no longer black, but blue. It’s the time when the stars can most influence the composition of the atmospheric air, before the sun throws everything into disarray.
And it’s also the coldest hour. The dew point can be defined as a point of relative humidity of the air at which the transition from gas to liquid occurs when the temperature drops. So we have a very subtle change of state.
A temperature inversion is created, where the layer of air closest to the ground becomes the coldest, while the air above may be slightly warmer. The blue hour, indeed.
Tell me about the blue hour.
The blue hour is also the most fruitful time for alchemical work. It is the moment when Mercury comes to light. It is also the hour when the final cooking of the philosopher’s egg should transform into the philosopher’s stone. You should understand the other peculiar element of this hour before dawn: the moon, that is, the night.
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