Lives of alchemystical philosophers To which is added a...

The name of this alchemical adept has been profoundly venerated not only in the memory of the Hermetists but in the hearts of the French people, among whom he is the central figure of many marvellous legends and traditions. “Whilst in all ages and nations the majority of hierophants have derived little but deception, ruination, and despair as the result of their devotion to alchemy, Nicholas Flamel enjoyed permanent good fortune and serenity. Far from expending his resources in the practice of the magnum opus, he added with singular suddenness a vast treasure to a moderate fortune. These he employed in charitable endowments and in pious foundations that long survived him and long sanctified his memory. He built churches and chapels which were adorned with statues of himself, accompanied by symbolical characters and mysterious crosses, which subsequent adepts long strove to decipher, that they might discover his secret history, and the kabbalistic description of the process by which he was conducted to the realisation of the Grand Magisterium.”

Whether Flamel was born at Paris or Pontoise is not more uncertain than the precise date of his nativity. This occurred some time during the reign of Philippe le Bel, the spoliator of the grand order of the Temple, and, on the whole, the most probable year is 1330. His parents were poor, and left him little more than the humble house in Paris which he continued to possess till his death, and which he eventually bequeathed to the Church. It stood in Notary Street, at the corner of Marivaux Street, opposite the Marivaux door of the Church of Saint-Jacques-la-Boucherie.

Authorities disagree as to the amount of education that Flamel obtained in his youth, but it was sufficient to qualify him for the business of a scrivener, which, in spite of his wealth and his accredited wisdom, he continued to follow through life. He was proficient in painting and poetry, and had a taste for architecture and the mathematical sciences; yet he applied himself steadily to business, and contracted a prudent marriage, his choice falling on a widow, named Pernelle, who, though handsome, was over forty years, but who brought a considerable dowry to her second husband.

In his capacity as a copyist before the age of printing, books of all classes fell into the hands of Flamel, and among them were many of those illuminated alchemical treatises which are reckoned among the rarest treasures of mediæval manuscripts. Acquainted with the Latin language, he insensibly accumulated an exoteric knowledge of the aims and theories of the adepts. His interest and curiosity were awakened, and he began studying them in his leisure moments. Now tradition informs us that, whether his application was great, his desire intense, or whether he was super-eminently fitted to be included by divine election among the illuminated Sons of the Doctrine, or for whatever other reason, the mystical Bath-Kôl appeared to him under the figure of an angel, bearing a remarkable book bound in well-wrought copper, the leaves of thin bark, graven right carefully with a pen of iron. An inscription in characters of gold contained a dedication addressed to the Jewish nation by Abraham the Jew, prince, priest, astrologer, and philosopher.

At these words Flamel eagerly stretched out his hands to take possession of the priceless gift, but book and angel disappeared in an auriferous tide of light. The scrivener awoke to be ravished henceforth by the divine dream of alchemy; but so long a time passed without any fulfilment of the angelic promise, that the ardour of his imagination cooled, the great hope dwindled gradually away, and he was settling once more into the commonplace existence of a plodding scribe, when, on a certain day of election in the year 1357, an event occurred which bore evidence of the veracity of his visionary promise-maker, and exalted his ambition and aspirations to a furnace heat. This event, with the consequences it entailed, are narrated in the last testament of Nicholas Flamel, which begins in the following impressive manner, but omits all reference to the legendary vision:—

“And Thou, O Lord God Almighty, as Thou, out of Thy infinite and most desirable goodness, hast condescended to open the earth and unlock Thy treasures unto me, Thy poor and unworthy servant, and hast given into my possession the fountains and well-springs of all the treasures and riches of this world.

“So, O Lord God, out of Thine abundant kindness, extend Thy mercies unto me, that when I shall cease to be any longer in the land of the living, Thou mayst open unto me the celestial riches, the divine treasures, and give me a part or portion in the heavenly inheritance for ever.

“I, Nicholas Flamel, Scrivener, living at Paris, anno 1399, in the Notary Street, near St James, of the Bouchery, though I learned not much Latin, because of the poorness and meanness of my parents, who were notwithstanding (by them that envy me most) accounted honest and good people.

“For which cause sake there shall not any moment of my life pass, wherein remembering this so vast a good, I will not on my bare knees, if the place will permit of it, or otherwise in my heart, with all the entireness of my affections, render thanks to this my most good and precious God.

“It was not made of paper or parchment, as other books are, but of admirable rinds (as it seemed to me) of young trees. The cover of it was of brass; it was well bound, and graven all over with a strange kind of letters, which I take to be Greek characters, or some such like.

“Upon the first seventh leaf was depicted—1. A Virgin. 2. Serpents swallowing her up. On the second seventh, a serpent crucified; and on the last seventh, a desert or wilderness, in midst whereof were seen many fair fountains, whence issued out a number of serpents here and there.

“In the second leaf of the book he consoled his nation, and gave them pious counsel to turn from their wickedness and evil ways, but above all to flee from idolatry, and to wait in patience for the coming of the Messiah, who, conquering all the kings and potentates of the earth, should reign in glory with his people to eternity. Without doubt, this was a very pious, wise, and understanding man.

“In the third leaf, and in all the writings that followed, he taught them, in plain words, the transmutation of metals, to the end that he might help and assist his dispersed people to pay their tribute to the Roman Emperors, and some other things not needful here to be repeated.

“But of the prima materia or first matter, or agent, he spake not so much as one word; but only he told them that in the fourth and fifth leaves he had entirely painted or decyphered it, and depicted or figured it, with a desirable dexterity and workmanship.

“Now though it was singularly well and materially or intelligibly figured and painted, yet by that could no man ever have been able to understand it without having been well skilled in their Cabala, which is a series of old traditions, and also to have been well studied in their books.

“This seemed in my mean apprehension to be one of the heathen gods, namely, Mercury. Against him there came running and flying with open wings, a great old man with an hour-glass fixed upon his head, and a scythe in his hands, like Death, with which he would (as it were in indignation) have cut off the feet of Mercury.

“On the other side of the fourth leaf he painted a fair flower, on the top of a very high mountain, which was very much shaken by the north wind. Its footstalk was blue, its flowers white and red, and its leaves shining like fine gold, and round about it the dragons and griffins of the north made their nests and habitations.