The operator ha;, con sum mated his task nut when it has been destroyed, but when fie has penetrated into the depths of the Metal.” Bernard of Treviso, Philosophic des mcraux, BPC, 2:388-89.
Flamel, Figures hicrog!yphiqucs, BPC2.259. The waters of Egypt also represent "the routine thoughts of mortals."
: B. Valentine, Dudici chiavi, 21. Pelagius (CAG. 3'260) says that "the dissolution in the divine Water is called iosis because ios—poison, active force, virus—resides in it potentially and then becomes active (the awakening and flight of the dragon). ration as though they were synonyms.289 We now find ourselves at one of the first phases of the formation ot the hermetic Androgyne, composed of Sulfur and Mercury. The "two enemies” are embracing one another. The two serpents of the caduccus are intertwining themselves (male with female) around the rod of Hermes. In the Divine Water or Mercury of the Wise begins the state of unity, which is the true "First Matter” from which it is possible to obtain all the "Elements” and "Kingdoms” of the Great Work. But the work is arduous: "We must understand that we are in the midst of a terrible labor, trying to reduce to a common essence— that is, to wed the two Natures [active to passive, individual to universal]."290 When the "black" has reached its limit, when immobility is complete, and when everything seems deprived of life and sound as in chaos or in "Tartarus"—then the Earth is known. But in this desert of death and darkness a splendor announces itself. It is the beginning of the second Kingdom, that of Jupiter who dethrones Black Saturn and is prelude to the White Moon. Dawn ("The Light of Nature”) breaks. The water of death becomes the Water of Resurrection. Once the body has been dissolved and that darkness dissipated that (according to the Cosmopolite) represents the body to the human eye, and once the "pores” (gateways) have been opened—Nature begins to operate and the Spirit manifests itself in the metallic "congealed” body,291 This is the "White Opus,” the albedo.
