Explication très curieuse des enigmes et figures hierogliphiques et Métropolitaine de Notre-Dame de Paris

Explication très curieuse des enigmes et figures hierogliphiques 

et Métropolitaine de Notre-Dame de Paris

VERY CURIOUS EXPLANATION OF ENIGMAS

AND HIEROGLYPHIC FIGURES, PHYSICAL, 

WHO ARE AT THE GREAT PORTAL 

OF THE CATHEDRAL AND METROPOLITAN CHURCH 

OF NOTRE-DAME DE PARIS

BY 

LE SIEUR ESPRIT GOBINEAU DE MONTLUISANT

GENTILHOMME CHARTRAIN, 

FRIEND OF NATURAL AND ALCHEMICAL PHILOSOPHY AND OTHER VERY OLD PHILOSOPHERS 

Precious Treasure

These six figures are, so to speak, only the repetition of what has already been said so many times in different figures and different terms, which are inexhaustible, by the lack of work and the simplicity of the material, which is nonetheless to know that to the true Philosophers, and not to the ignorant Sophists, some research that they do, because their intention is bad and proud and that this divine gift is granted only to the simple and humble of heart, despised by the rest of the world is insane, and unfortunate enough in its blindness, to feast on nothing but transitory fables.

1. The eagle, for example, signifies nothing but the universal Spirit of the world; and it is the Bird of Hermes, and the perpetual movement of the Sages.

2. The caduceus, entangled with two serpents, teaches that the stone is composed of two substances, though drawn from the same body, and extracted from the same root; these two substances, however, seem to be contrary in appearance, one being moist and the other cuttlefish, one volatile and the other fixed; but they are similar in essence and in effect, because they are two in nature, coming from a single principle, although they are really only one.

3. The Phenix which burns itself, and is reborn from its own ashes, teaches us that these two substances, after having been put into the philosophical egg in the Athanor, act for a long time and naturally against each other, that they fight furiously before kissing and uniting; that the war is long before receiving the kiss of peace; that the waves of the philosophical sea are agitated for a long time by the ebb and flow, before goodness and calm can succeed and reign; lastly, that the works are very great before these two substances are finally reduced to powder or suffer incombustible; for this can only be done after the wet Mercuriel has been consumed, or rather desiccated by the great activity of the warm and dry internal of the bodily substance of the Salt of Nature, and that all the compost is made similar. It is after these burnings, or philosophical calcinations, that this powder, the true Phenix of the Sages, because there is in the world no Phoenix other than this one, being dissolved again in his virgin milk, returns to to be born again by oneself, and from one's own ashes, and thus continues to be reborn and to die, just as many times as it pleases to the well experienced Artist.

..........

Now, as it pleased Divine Providence to give me the grace to give me some light and knowledge of Philosophy, Physics and Hermetics, I worked so much that after a long time, a lot of care, reading good Books, and having done a lot of beautiful and good operations, I finally found the triple key by its essence, to open the sanctuary of the Sages, or rather of the wise Nature so that I can faithfully explain the parabolic and enigmatic writings ancient and modern Philosophers, as I have explained quite clearly the Enigmas, Parables, and Hieroglifs of this triple Portal; what I do very willingly, to give satisfaction to the learned amateurs of this Divine Art, and to excite the curiosity of the new Candidates, who aspire to the knowledge of natural and hermetic Science; of which God is praised and exalted forever. So be it.