Reading Routes

Each route begins with historical passages and returns to them after the suggested study aid. The order is an editorial invitation, rather than a rearrangement of Vaughan’s text.

Read the Whole Publication

Begin with the title, continue through both dedications, P. B.’s poem and the address to the reader, then read Magia from its opening through the top of page 78. Continue immediately with Coelum’s new address through the closing poem, doxology, Amen and printed corrections. Return to the essay on the transition and assess what changes between the two discourses.

Follow Religion and Natural Knowledge

Read the definition of magic, the religious signs, the distinction between the soul’s rest and the stone, then the warning about Creator and creature. Use the first essay to compare the different claims, then return to the passages and distinguish what is defined, argued and warned against.

Trace the Fall and Renewal

Move from the loss of relation to human necessities, merciful instruction and generation and regeneration. Continue to the two extremes. Read the restoration essay, then ask where the original text makes an explicit scriptural appeal and where it reasons from what would be fitting.

Test the Case for Antiquity

Begin with the problem of the past, then compare Jacob’s practice, the reported Chinese monument, the qualified story about Aristotle and the confession of practical error. Use the testimony and experience essay to separate kinds of evidence, then reread the qualifications in the historical prose.

Follow Letters and Images

Read name and thing, the Three Mothers, the ladder and the described illustrated book. Continue with Hyanthe and Vaughan’s defence of the poem. Consult the essay on representation and the poem guide, then return to identify which details are described, interpreted or withheld.

Read the Natural Subject Cautiously

Begin with love and generation, the soft salt, the exclusions, the natural bath and the composition of a sperm. Compare the historical glossary with the complete passages. Ask how Vaughan distinguishes his subject from readily available substances, rather than supplying a modern identity from an isolated name.