Solomon's Secret Arts

by Paul Kléber Monod

  38. Simon Thurley, Whitehall Palace: An Architectural History of the Royal Apartments, 1240–1690 (New Haven, 1999), p. 114; M.L. Wolbarscht and D.S. Sax, “Charles II: A Royal Martyr?” Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London, 16, 2 (1961), pp. 154–7; Antonia Fraser, Royal Charles: Charles II and the Restoration (New York, 1979), p. 450.

  39. “James Hasolle” [Elias Ashmole], “Prolegomena,” in Arthur Dee, Fasciculus Chemicus: or Chymical Collections (London, 1650), pp. [viii–ix].

  40. George Thor, An Easie Introduction to the Philosophers Magical Gold: To Which Is Added Zorasters Cave; As Also John Pontanus Epistle upon the Mineral Fire; Otherwise Called, The Philosophers Stone (London, 1667), p. [i].

  41. J[ohn] W[ilkins], Mathematicall Magick (London, 1648), p. 226.

  42. This is not the view of William R. Newman and Lawrence M. Principe, who have argued that alchemy was primarily a practical pursuit. While they acknowledge a separate strain of alchemy, which they call “mystical,” they do not give it much attention. This chapter takes a different approach, but Newman and Principe deserve enormous credit for reviving interest in seventeenth-century alchemy.

  43. Keith Thomas, Religion and the Decline of Magic (New York, 1970), pp. 270–1; Christopher Hill, The World Turned Upside Down: Radical Ideas during the English Revolution (Harmondsworth, Middlesex, 1991), p. 185; Nicolson and Hutton, eds, Conway Letters, p. 42.

  44. Hermes Trismegistus, The Divine Pymander, trans. John Everard (London, 1650). A 1657 reissue of this work added the short tract known as the Asclepius, which had been known in a Latin version throughout the Middle Ages.

  45. Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa, Three Books of Occult Philosophy, trans. J. F[reake] (London, 1651), sigs Av1-A2, b1-b2. For Child, see Newman, Gehennical Fire, pp. 41–2, and Wilkinson, “Hartlib Papers, Part II,” pp. 99–100.

  46. Agrippa, Three Books, book 1, ch. 2, pp. 2–3.

  47. D.P. Walker, Spiritual and Demonic Magic from Ficino to Campanella (London, 1958), pp. 90–6; also, Wayne Shumaker, Occult Sciences in the Renaissance: A Study in Intellectual Patterns (Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1972), pp. 134–56; John S. Mebane, Renaissance Magic and the Return of the Golden Age: The Occult Traditions of Marlowe, Jonson and Shakespeare (Lincoln, Nebraska, 1989), ch. 4.

  48. The best overall treatment of the phenomenon is Brian Levack, The Witch-Hunt in Early Modern Europe (3rd ed., London, 2006). For England, see James Sharp, Instruments of Darkness: Wichcraft in Early Modern England (Philadelphia, 1997).

  49. ODNB; Robert Turner, Ars Notoria: The Notory Art of Solomon (London, 1657), p. 136. See also S. Liddell MacGregor Mathers, ed., The Key of Solomon the King (Clavicula Salomonis) (London, 1888, repr. 1972).

  50. Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa, His Fourth Book of Occult Philosophy, trans. Robert Turner (London, 1664).

  51. Elias Ashmole, Theatrum Chemicum Britannicum (London, 1652), sig. A2, p. 436. The comparison between England and ancient nations was first made by Ashmole in the preface to Fasciculus Chemicus.

  52. Josten, ed., Ashmole, vol. 1, pp. 76–8, vol. 2, pp. 567–9, 588–9, 643. A detailed discussion of Ashmole's alchemy can be found in Bruce Janacek, Alchemical Belief: Occultism in the Religious Culture of Early Modern England (University Park, Pa., 2012), ch. 5.

  53. Robert Turner, trans., Paracelsus: Of the Chymical Transmutation, Genealogy and Generation of Metals and Minerals (London, 1657), sig. A2. Turner also translated Paracelsus: Of the Supreme Mysteries of Nature. Of the Spirits of the Planets. Of Occult Philosophy (London, 1655), which shows that he was not just interested in iatrochemical medicines.

  54. Josten, ed., Ashmole, vol. 2, pp. 733–4, citing an allusion to Everard in the preface to Elias Ashmole, ed., The Way to Bliss (London, 1658), that is clarified in Bodl. Lib., Ashmole Ms. 537.

  55. Lauren Kassell, “Reading for the Philosopher's Stone,” in Marina Frasca-Spada and Nick Jardine, eds, Books and the Sciences in History (Cambridge, 2000), pp. 135–42. Ashmole's copy of this manuscript is in Bodl. Lib., Ashmole Ms. 1419, ff. 57–82. Isaac Newton also had a copy, which is in KCL, Keynes Ms 22, M&P, reel 18.

  56. Ashmole, Theatrum Chemicum Britannicum, sigs Av3-B1.

  57. Ashmole, Theatrum Chemicum Britannicum, p. 444; Josten, ed., Ashmole, vol. 1, pp. 72, 226–7, and references in index under “Sigils,” “Talismans” and “Telesmes.”

  58. Arthur Dee, Fasciculus Chemicus: or Chymical Collections, ed. James Hasolle [Elias Ashmole] (London, 1650), pp. x–xi.

  59. Ashmole, Theatrum Chemicum Britannicum, pp. 444–7.

  60. “Eirenaeus Philalethes” [George Starkey], Ripley Reviv'd; or, An Exposition upon Sir George Ripley's Hermetico-Poetical Works (London, 1678), Advertisement.

  61. This is the central premise of Lawrence M. Principe and William R. Newman, “Some Problems with the Historiography of Alchemy,” in William R. Newman and Anthony Grafton, eds, Secrets of Nature: Astrology and Alchemy in Early Modern Europe (Cambridge, Mass., 2001), pp. 385–431.

  62. KCL, Keynes Ms 22, M&P, reel 18; Principe, The Aspiring Adept, pp. 191–200, 310–16.

  63. [George Starkey], Ripley Reviv'd, pp. 4, 7, 46, 107. “Chalybs” denotes iron or steel.

  64. For his advice to doctors, see George Starkey, Nature's Explication and Helmont's Vindication (London, 1658). Newman's treatment of Starkey's life in Gehennical Fire is exhaustive, but he tends to discount the cryptic language of Starkey's alchemy as a mere convention.

  65. All of these tracts are superbly edited, with copious annotations, in the 1984 edition of Vaughan's Works by Alan Rudrum, which supersedes the previous editions by A.E. Waite.

  66. Wilkinson, “Hartlib Papers, Part I,” p. 63; Rudrum, “Biographical Introduction,” pp. 11–13. Henshaw hinted at his clandestine activities during the Commonwealth period, and expressed his passionate hatred of Cromwell, in his Vindication of Thomas Henshaw, Esquire (The Spaw, 1654).

  67. Recent works on the early Rosicrucians include Carlos Gilly. Cimelia Rhodostaurotica: Die Rosenkreuzer im Spiegel der zwischen 1610 und 1660 entstandenen Handschriften und Drucke (Amsterdam, 1995), an exhibition catalogue from the Ritman Library; Friedrich Niewöhner and Carlos Gilly, eds, Rosenkreuz als europäisches Phänomen im 17. Jahrhundert (Amsterdam, 2001); Didier Kahn,“The Rosicrucian Hoax in France,” in Newman and Grafton, eds, Secrets of Nature, pp. 235–344.

  68. Theophilus Schweighardt, Speculum Sophium Rhodo-Stauraticum Das ist: Weitläuffige Entdeckung des Collegii und axiomatum von der sondern erleuchen Fraternitat Christ-RosenCreutz (1618), p. 3.

  69. “Eugenius Philalethes” [Thomas Vaughan], “Preface,” The Fame and Confession of the Fraternity of R: C: Commonly, of the Rosie Cross (London, 1653), in Rudrum, Works, pp. 479–510. For Rosenkreuz on alchemy, see Fama Fraternitatis oder Entdeckung der Bruderschafft des löblichen Ordens des Rosenkreuzes (Danzig, 1615), pp. 47–9. Rosenkreuz's opposition to gold-making may be a joke, as his name suggests the “rosebud-on-cross” symbol that is associated with mercury, the alchemist's favourite substance.

  70. Frances Yates, The Rosicrucian Enlightenment (London, 1972); Hutchinson, Henry Vaughan, pp. 148–9.

  71. “Eugenius Philalethes” [Thomas Vaughan], Magia Adamica: or, The Antiquitie of Magic, and The Descent Thereof from Adam Downwards, Proved (London, 1650), in Rudrum, ed., Works, p. 150.

  72. [Vaughan], Magia Adamica, p. 215, and note on p. 652 (an unclear reference in the text seems to imply that Vaughan saw Boehme as a fellow Rosicrucian); see also the note on p. 677 to a possible reference to Boehme in “Eugenius Philalethes” [Thomas Vaughan], Lumen de Lumine (London, 1651), p. 313. Blunden's publications are discussed in Philip West, Henry Vaughan's “Silex Scintillans”: Scripture Uses (Oxford, 2001), p. 63. For Vaughan and Boehme, see Serge Hutin, Les Disciples Anglais de Jacob Boehme au XVII et XVIII Siècles (Paris, 1960), p. 77, and B.J. Gibbons, Gender in Mystical and Occult Thought: Behmenism and its Development in England (Cambridge, 1996), ch. 3.

  73. “Eugenius Philalethes” [Thomas
Vaughan], Anthroposophia Theomagica (London, 1650), p. 53; Jacob Boehme, The Epistles of Jacob Behmen, aliter, Teutonicus Philosophus (London, 1649), pp. 1–17.

  74. These ideas appear in Anthroposophia Theomagica, pp. 66–8, 78, and throughout Magia Adamica.

  75. Heinrich Khunrath, Ampitheatrum Sapientiae Aeternae ([Vienna], 1602), p. 147. For Hartlib and Khunrath, see Clucas, “Correspondence of a ‘Chymical Gentleman,’” p. 149.

  76. Boehme's “Sophia” appears in ch. 52 of his Mysterium Magnum. Humphrey Blunden published parts of this work, but not this particular chapter, in a 1649 English compilation entitled Mercurius Teutonicus. A full translation of Mysterium Magnum was published by Blunden in 1654. It is possible that Vaughan did not read Boehme's whole work until after his own discussion of the passage from Genesis was published in Anthroposophia Theomagica, pp. 58–63. Fludd's version of the scene is graphically depicted in the “First Treatise” of Utriusque Cosmi Maioris (2 vols, Oppenheim, 1617), vol. i, p. 49.

  77. [Vaughan], Magia Adamica, pp. 180–1. See also Wolf-Dieter Müller-Jahncke, “Agrippa von Nettelsheim et la Kabbale,” in Antoine Faivre and Frédérick Tristan, eds, Kabbalistes Chrétiens (Paris, 1979), pp. 197–209.

  78. As with almost every aspect of the history of this period, there is disagreement about how to interpret the divisions within the Church of England. For conflicting views, see Nicholas Tyacke, Anti-Calvinists: The Rise of English Arminianism, c. 1590–1640 (Oxford, 1987), and Julian Davies, The Caroline Captivity of the Church: Charles I and the Remoulding of Anglicanism, 1625–1641 (Oxford, 1992).

  79. Henry More, Enthusiasmus Triumphantus (London, 1655). More saw Jacob Boehme as a naive enthusiast, and he may have put Vaughan in the same category: see Sarah Hutton, “Henry More and Jacob Boehme,” in Sarah Hutton, ed., Henry More (1614–1687): Tercentenary Essays (Dordrecht, 1990), pp. 157–68. Vaughan admitted that his “Revelations” might be counted among those of “Ranters and Anabaptists” in Euphrates, or The Waters of the East (London, 1655), p. 515. An interpretation of Vaughan's debate with More that emphasizes its importance for empirical science is found in Frederic B. Burnham, “The More-Vaughan Controversy: The Revolt against Philosophical Enthusiasm,” Journal of the History of Ideas, 35, 1 (1974), pp. 33–49.

  80. [Vaughan], Anthroposophia Theomagica, p. 54.

  81. Michael Sendivogius, A New Light of Alchemy (London, 1650); Newman, Gehennical Fire, pp. 215–27.

  82. West, Henry Vaughan's “Silex Scintillans”, ch. 2; E.C. Pettet, Of Paradise and Light: A Study of Vaughan's “Silex Scintillans” (Cambridge, 1960), ch. 4; Elizabeth Holmes, Henry Vaughan and the Hermetic Philosophy (New York, 1932, 1967).

  83. Rudrum, “Biographical Introduction,” pp. 18–21; “Eugenius Philalethes” [Thomas Vaughan], The Second Wash: or The Moore Scour'd Once More (London, 1651), in Rudrum, ed., Works, pp. 429–31.

  84. “Alazonomastix Philalethes” [Henry More], Observations upon “Antroposophia Theomagica” and “Anima Magica Abscondita” (“Parrhesia” [London], 1650), pp. 26, 88–90. For More and Descartes, see A. Rupert Hall, Henry More and the Scientific Revolution (Cambridge, 1990), ch. 8.

  85. “Eugenius Philalethes” [Thomas Vaughan], The Man-Mouse Taken in a Trap, and Tortur'd to Death (London, 1650), p. 243.

  86. [Henry More], The Second Lash of Alazonomastix, Laid On in Mercy against that Stubborn Youth Eugenius Philalethes (Cambridge, 1651), pp. 4, 72, 109, 179.

  87. Ibid., p. 193.

  88. [More], Enthusiasmus Triumphatus, pp. 1, 5.

  89. The British Library contains copies of eighteen auction catalogues issued by Cooper between 1676 and 1688. The quotation is from his first catalogue, Catalogus Variorum et Insignium Librorum Instructissimae Bibliothecae Clarissimi Doctissimiq; Viri Lazari Seaman, S.T.D. (London, 1676), “To the Reader.” A satirical Latin dialogue, evidently aimed at a scholarly audience, was written on the last of his sales, held at Oxford: [George Smalridge?], Auctio Davisiana Oxonii Habita (London, 1689). For auctions in England during this period, see Iain Pears, The Discovery of Painting: The Growth of Interest in the Arts in England, 1680–1768 (New Haven, Conn., 1988), pp. 57–67.

  90. [William Cooper, ed.], Collectanea Chymica: A Collection of Ten Several Treatises in Chymistry Concerning the Liquor Alkahest, the Mercury of Philosophers, and Other Curiosities Worthy the Perusal (London, 1684), “To the Reader,” p. [i]. This preface is signed “W.C.B.” for William Cooper, Bibliopolam, and was therefore written by Cooper himself.

  91. Newman, Gehennical Fire, pp. 262–70; B.J.T. Dobbs, “Newton's Copy of Secrets Reveal'd,” Ambix, 26, 3 (1979), pp. 145–69.

  92. The identity of “W.C., Esq.” as “William Chamberlain” was discovered by P.J. Ash and published in Josten, ed., Ashmole, vol. 3, p. 1289, Addendum. Unfortunately, the information was not noticed by the compilers of the ODNB articles on William Cooper and William Chamberlayne. Josten did not connect the author of the Philosophicall Epitaph with the poet, but it is very likely that they were the same man, as no other person of that name was actively publishing during the period. William Chamberlayne of Shaftesbury was chiefly known for the heroic epic Pharonnida (London, 1659), in which a wonder-working alchemist appears in book 5, canto 3. Lauren Kassel, however, is cautious about the identity of William Chamberlayne in “Secrets Revealed,” p. 65.

  93. “Eirenaeus Philalethes” [George Starkey], Secrets Reveal'd: or, An Open Entrance to the Shut-Palace of the King, ed. W[illiam] C[hamberlayne] (London, 1669), Dedication, p. [ii]; W[illiam] C[hamberlayne], A Philosophicall Epitaph in Hieroglyphicall Figures with Explanation (London, 1673), Dedication to Elias Ashmole.

  94. William Jenkyn, Exodus … A Sermon Preach't Sept. 12 1675 by Reason of the Much Lamented Death of that Learned and Reverend Minister of Christ, Dr. Lazarus Seaman (London, 1675).

  95. Both Jenkyn and Manton are noted in ODNB. For Pinners’ Hall, see Michael R. Watts, The Dissenters: From the Reformation to the French Revolution (Oxford, 1978), pp. 294, 296.

  96. Defensio Legis, or, The Whole State of England Inquisited and Defended for General Satisfaction (London, 1674), p. 313.

  97. Frederick Helvetius, A Brief of the Golden Calf, or The Worlds Idol, ed. and trans. W[illiam] C[hamberlayne] (n.p., n.d.), “To the Reader,” p. [iv], printed in C[hamberlayne]., Philosophicall Epitaph.

  98. For illustrations of the pelican in alchemical works, see Alexander Roob, The Hermetic Museum: Alchemy and Mysticism (Cologne, 2001), pp. 138, 180, 415, 439. For its Christian significance, see Peter and Linda Murray, The Oxford Companion to Christian Art and Architecture (Oxford, 1996), p. 58.

  99. C[hamberlayne]., Philosophicall Epitaph, frontispiece and p. [11]. For the anima mundi, see Shumaker, Occult Sciences, ch. 3; Walker, Spiritual and Demonic Magic.

  100. C[hamberlayne]., Philosophicall Epitaph, p. [21].

  101. Shumaker, Occult Sciences, p. 127.

  102. The original is Paul Felgenhauer, Das Buchlein Jehi Or, oder Morgenröhte der Weißheit (Amsterdam, 1640). For Felgenhauer, see Alastair Hamilton, The Apocryphal Apocalypse: The Reception of the 2nd Book of Esdras (4 Ezra) from the Renaissance to the Enlightenment (Oxford, 1999), pp. 178–83, 222–3.

  103. [Paul Felgenhauer], Jehior or The Day Dawning; or Morning Light of Wisdom, pp. 22, 36–7, 55–7, printed with C[hamberlayne]., Philosophicall Epitaph.

  104. Ibid., pp. 43–5, 58, 71–2.

  105. Pordage is discussed below in Chapter Four; for Erbery, see Hill, The World Turned Upside Down, pp. 92–7; Christopher Hill, The Experience of Defeat: Milton and Some Contemporaries (New York, 1984), pp. 84–97.

  106. See William R. Newman and Lawrence Principe, Alchemy Tried in the Fire: Starkey, Boyle, and the Fate of Van Helmontian Chymistry (Chicago, 2001). Cooper published Sir Kenelm Digby, A Choice Collection of Rare Secrets and Experiments in Philosophy, ed. George Hartman (London, 1682); J.B. van Helmont, Praecipiolum: or The Immature-Mineral-Electrum the First Metal: Which Is the Minera of Mercury (London, 1683); and Th
e Works of Geber (London, 1686).

  107. William Cooper, ed., A Catalogue of Chymicall Books (London, 1675). The first edition was published along with the Philosophicall Epitaph in 1673, and a third edition appeared in 1688. See Kassell, “Secrets Revealed,” pp. 70–8. A list of magical books, possibly by Cooper, is in BL, Sloane 696.

  Chapter Two: The Silver Age of the Astrologers

  1. Patrick Curry's classic work, Prophecy and Power: Astrology in Early Modern England (Princeton, 1989), ch. 2, places the heyday of astrology in the period 1640 to 1660. Keith Thomas suggests a similar chronology in Religion and the Decline of Magic (New York, 1971), chs 10–12.

  2. Booker, Culpeper and Tanner were republicans; Wharton and Saunders were royalists; Wing accepted any regime in power. Lilly's complicated politics in this period, and the impact of astrological language on the times, are the subjects of Ann Geneva, Astrology and the Seventeenth-Century Mind: William Lilly and the Language of the Stars (Manchester, 1995).

  3. Curry, Prophecy and Power, pp. 21, 40–3. The Astrologers’ Feast was revived by Elias Ashmole in 1682–3, in the wake of the Exclusion Crisis. By that point, most leading astrologers were Tories, which suggests that the renewed Feast may have had a political connotation.

  4. For astrology and medicine, see Louise Hill Curth, English Almanacs, Astrology and Popular Medicine, 1550–1700 (Manchester, 2008).

  5. Lauren Kassell, Medicine and Magic in Elizabethan London: Simon Forman, Astrologer, Alchemist and Physician (Oxford, 2007), pp. 75–99; Michael Macdonald, Mystical Bedlam: Madness, Anxiety and Healing in 17th-Century England (Chicago, 1983); Mordechai Feingold, “The Occult Tradition in the English Universities of the Renaissance: A Reassessment,” in Brian Vickers, ed., Occult and Scientific Mentalities in the Renaissance (Cambridge, 1986), pp. 73–94.