OLD AND NEW ALCHEMY 247 



cle, has done what was possible to elucidate the obscurity. 

 His diligent labors have brought many confused facts and 

 assertions into their proper sequence, so that we can now, 

 at least, partially understand how the fanatics, knaves, and 

 dupes of Gnostic Egypt came by their mysterious tenets. 

 The superstitions and opinions they embodied proceeded 

 from various sources, and primarily from Babylonia, the 

 hotbed of occultism. The walls of Ecbatana, as described 

 by Herodotus, 1 illustrate the connection. They were seven- 

 fold, and vario-tinted, the five outer circuits being embel- 

 lished with the colors distinctive of the several planets, 

 while the inner ramparts glittered in gold and silver to 

 represent the sun and moon. Thus, the combined arrange- 

 ment, like the seven-storied temple of Nebo at Borsippa, 

 typified the majestic succession of the celestial spheres. 

 Now the planets, no less than the sun and moon, claimed 

 symbolical metals. Lead was appropriated to Saturn, tin 

 to Jupiter, iron to Mars, copper to Venus, and quicksilver 

 (after its full acquaintance was made) to Mercury. And 

 the relationship was looked upon as intimate and real. 

 Each metal was not only the client, but, in a sense, the off- 

 spring of a fostering heavenly body. It grew in the bowels 

 of the earth under its influence ; it derived from it special 

 affinities and magical properties; it incorporated the sub- 

 sensual action of a celestial operative power. That the 

 metals, then few and scarce, should be regarded with rever- 

 ence is hardly to be wondered at. They were obtained 

 with difficulty and brought from afar; they came forth 

 from the fiercest ordeal by fire purified and vivified; they 

 approved themselves in sundry ways as indispensable 

 civilizing agents. 



The visionary metallurgy of Babylonia had its practical 

 counterpart in Egypt. There the arts of smelting ore and 

 of modifying and manipulating the products established 

 their headquarters. Ptah of Memphis was a highly efficient 



! Book I, cap. 98. 



