Imbibition, cibation and the infant

Use in the book

The earth must first be made ready to receive nourishment. Even clarified earth may have attracted unwanted moisture, which must be removed before the simple mercury feeds it in infancy (LXXX). Dryness, fineness and brittleness should appear; if they do not, the author allows defective purification or remaining moisture as explanations (LXXXI). Beginning imbibitions too soon may damage the work and mercury or, at least, waste time (LXXXII). Preparation thus precedes feeding causally, not merely as an arbitrary earlier step.

The identification is explicit in LXXXIII: simple mercury is virgin’s milk, and the earth’s rapid absorption like a sponge shows the infant’s hunger. The comparison describes receptivity, not just tenderness or purity. If the infant fails to become dry and brittle again within the stated interval, the author says excessive feeding has overcome it (LXXXIV). LXXXV then joins understanding, proportion and management as conditions of a successful end. Knowledge of the name of the food is not sufficient without judgement about its use.

Heat governs the bond that feeding should produce. During imbibitions it must remain moderate, lest mercury be forced to leave earth; moderate heat joins soul and body, while violent heat separates them (LXXXVI). Repetition continues until the author’s signs appear. Even the matter’s reception of its own weight of mercury is not presented as an automatic stopping point: if wax-like flow, exceptional whiteness and fixity are absent, imbibitions continue (LXXXVII). LXXXVIII similarly makes saturation legible through renewed flow like wax. The observed state controls the claimed completion more than a bare count of additions.

At the white elixir, nourishment offers a choice of direction. Continued imbibitions with simple mercury may multiply it before fermentation with silver (XC). To seek the highest perfection instead, the white elixir is fed with its own flesh and blood, immediately defined as double mercury (XCI). The new food therefore has a named material relation to the earlier preparation. It is not common gold or silver introduced under a euphemism.

The first feeding in this continuation brings a cloud and contest of fixed with volatile (XCII). Subsequent feedings involve renewed colours and digestion, strengthening the infant until it is fully saturated and called the great elixir (XCIV–XCVI). The life image continues through mature stages; “infant” can still name the work while the passage describes increasing strength, rather than marking a single fixed chronological age.

Places to read

1. Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXIIIOriginalDouble mercury’s imbibitions follow the salt’s saturation with simple mercury.
2. Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXVIOriginalFormation and feeding are distinguished from the later use of common precious metals.
3. Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXXOriginalClarified earth is prepared to receive nourishment in infancy.
4. Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXXIOriginalDryness, fineness and brittleness are readiness signs.
5. Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXXIIOriginalPremature imbibition may harm the work or cost time.
6. Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXXIIIOriginalSimple mercury is virgin’s milk; sponge-like absorption shows hunger.
7. Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXXIVOriginalFailure of renewed dryness is attributed to excessive feeding.
8. Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXXVOriginalUnderstanding, proportion and management govern successful nourishment.
9. Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXXVIOriginalModerate heat maintains the desired union during feeding.
10. Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXXVIIOriginalThe required signs qualify the quantitative milestone.
11. Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXXVIIIOriginalSaturation is marked by flow like wax.
12. Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXXIXOriginalFusibility, whiteness and fixity mark the perfected white elixir.
13. Grand Elixir · Aphorism XCOriginalSimple mercury can multiply the white elixir before fermentation.
14. Grand Elixir · Aphorism XCIOriginalDouble mercury is the flesh and blood of further perfection.
15. Grand Elixir · Aphorism XCIIOriginalThe new feeding produces cloud and conflict before fixed union.
16. Grand Elixir · Aphorism XCIVOriginalFeeding with double mercury precedes the states and colours of further development.
17. Grand Elixir · Aphorism XCVOriginalThe essential colours give distinct meanings to conjunction, purification and maturation.
18. Grand Elixir · Aphorism XCVIOriginalRepeated nourishment, colour regeneration and digestion strengthen the infant.

In this edition

“Cibation” in LXXVI becomes “feeding”; “cibated” in XCI and XCIV becomes “fed.” “Notion” in LXXXV is rendered “understanding,” keeping it distinct from the following proportion and management (77). These choices make the vocabulary ordinary without discarding its technical relations.

The modern reading calls the matter an infant because the historical text does so, and identifies flesh and blood as double mercury because XCI itself supplies that identification. The edition’s notes 76 and 80 explain these local connections. They do not establish an additional psychological equivalence or replace the author’s theological possibilities with a purely secular gloss.

Historical forms and local uses:

Imbibitions [printed plural] — repeated soakings or feedings of the matter (Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXIII; Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXXII; Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXXV; Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXXVII; Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXXVIII; Grand Elixir · Aphorism XC)

Cibation [printed word] — feeding or nourishment (Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXVI; Grand Elixir · Aphorism XCVI)

cibated [printed verbal form] — fed or supplied with nourishment (Grand Elixir · Aphorism XCI; Grand Elixir · Aphorism XCIV)

Infant [printed word] — the matter being nourished towards maturity (Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXXIII; Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXXIV; Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXXV; Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXXVII; Grand Elixir · Aphorism XCVI)

Virgins Milk [printed phrase] — simple mercury used as nourishment (Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXXIII)

Flesh and Blood [printed phrase] — the double mercury used for further nourishment (Grand Elixir · Aphorism XCI; Grand Elixir · Aphorism XCVI)

saturated [printed verbal form] — supplied to the required fullness at the stated stage (Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXIII; Grand Elixir · Aphorism LXXXVIII; Grand Elixir · Aphorism XCVI)