hermetic manifestations
francis
I am reading Baigent & Leigh 1997 : The Elixir and the Stone, a history
of magic and alchemy.
It's a fascinating volume. Hard to put down yet often demanding pause
for re-reading and reflection. I found the opening chapters quite
straightforward. They cover much the same ground as I've recently read
in Frances Yates on Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition. That, and other
materials from previous reading and valuable supplements on the web.
What a joy it is to find the Corpus Hermeticum and the full text of the
Gnostic Mass so easily available. So these early chapters include some
familiar names - Trithemius, Pico della Mirandola, Heinrich Cornelius
Agrippa, to name but a few - all of whom might be encapsulated in the
well-known portrait of Doctor Faustus in the 1620 Marlowe. There is the
magician standing in his magic circle and confronting the conjured
Devil.
Once we are past the disastrously unsettling ages of the Protestant
Reformation and the Catholic Counter-Reformation, things begin to
change. Descartes, as it were, stands at the head of the list and
declaims : cogito ergo sum. It's a time of a complete change of
perspective - or almost complete, because the methods and processes of
scientific enquiry hog the broad light of day. Hermetic magic goes
behind closed and locked doors.
It's the chapters concerned with the artists of Sturm und Drang and the
later full bloom of Novalis's blue flower that set up quite a different
image. It's a cultural era I'm very familiar with, not just the musical
compositions (which are my speciality) but the other artworks and the
general historical framework as well. But, to my delight, Baigent &
Leigh have given me a completely new and striking insight. They point to
manifestations not generally appreciated. In my experience, much of the
art history of the period is set out in terms of 'great works by great
men' with little reference to the culture surrounding them and little
explanation, but much analysis, of the artists' works concerned.
I stand and look at paintings loosely classified under the heading '20th
century abstract art' and sense they are the visual counterpart of a
whole stratum from The Rite of Spring to the aleatory jewels of John
Cage. In my life up to now these compositions, collectively, have been
explained simply as 'this is the way artists have worked in our time'.
Now Baigent & Leigh release me from the confines of the galleries, the
printed texts, the musical scores. I begin to comprehend the magic of
creation implicit in the processes of artistic gestation and
parturition. I comprehend, too, an implicit aspect of Hermeticism : that
it is something shared by those in the know; hidden from those outside.
The clues are there but the clues have to be recognised and decoded
before the deeper meanings are revealed.
I am reminded of the myths presented to those in the Outer Court of the
Hellenistic Mysteries. Here are stories of gods and goddesses. Both
fanciful and endlessly fascinating. Move towards the labyrinth, peel
away a layer, and the obvious symbols for birth and death, seed time and
harvest, speak for themselves. Take the way forward to initiation, peel
away another layer, and be closer to the heart of the Mystery.
We can experience such a wealth of realities. It really is a magical
universe.
francis cameron
oxford, 27 march 2004
--
Francis
"Folly is an endless maze" - William Blake, 1789