Quotes About Alchemy

Moonlight possesses no alchemy to transmute good motives to base, but it does excite love magic...

the alchemy of grief transforms the most awkward phrases into sentiments of purest gold..

And every minute Newton didn't spend working on optics, physics, astronomy (including inventing the reflecting telescope), some harmless alchemy, and other sidebars of his mathematical discipline, he spent furtively studying the Bible and church history.

Ik weet niets van alchemie, maar ik zeg dit: zij zijn op de verkeerde weg. Het tastbare laat zich alleen door het ontastbare vormen. De werkelijkheid laat zich door niets veranderen dan door de geest. Om de dingen anders te maken hoef je ze niet aan te raken, je moet ze alleen anders zien.

It was an interminable labor, and he had always known it to be as hopeless as alchemy. The gold, the great and glowing masterpiece, would never shine amongst the dead ashes and smoking efforts of the crucible, but in the course of the life, in the interval between the failures, he might possibly discover curious things.

Old poetics played a large part in my alchemy of the word.

I was ripe for death and along a road of perils my weakness led me to the confines of the world and of Cimmeria, home of whirlwinds and of darkness. from Delirium (II), Alchemy of the Wind - Hunger

The alchemists in their search for gold discovered many other things of greater value.

I think what I love most about the raw food thing is it's real alchemy. It's a really interesting science, and I think for a creative person, it's a great way to eat.

You must know that for certain simples to attain their highest virtues they must be pulled from grave soil by moonlight.

I will tell you, as it was taught to me, the four spirits and the seven bodies, by order, as I oft heard my Master name them. The first spirit is called quicksilver, the second is arsenic, the third is sal ammoniac, and the fourth is brimstone. The seven bodies, lo, are here anon: the Sun is gold, the Moon is silver, Mars is iron, Mercury is quicksilver, Saturn is lead, Jupiter is tin, and Venus is copper.

Ah! Nay! Let it be. The Philosopher's Stone is what we seek, everyone. For, if we had it, we could then transmute lead into gold, and then would we be safe enough. But, unto God in Heaven, I do avow, in spite of all our craft, and all our efforts, and all our magic, the Stone will not come to us.

We know, in history, people are unable to put different elements together and create gold, yet it's what you're asking actors to do every day. You're asking them to relax enough with the confines and restrictions of the lights and the cameras, and you gotta hit this mark, to relax enough to create what seems wonderful and beautiful.

Rational intelligence is dangerous and leads to ratiocination. The painter is a medium who doesn't realize what he is doing. No translation can express the mystery of sensibility, a word, still unreliable, which is nevertheless the basis of painting or poetry, like a kind of alchemy.

Auroleus Phillipus Theostratus Bombastus von Hohenheim, better known as Paracelsus

Then hast our the Red Stone perfect with less labour, expense of time and costs, for the which ever thank God.

Of my conception I know only what you know of yours. It occurred in darkness and I was unconsenting... By some bleak alchemy what had been mere unbeing becomes death when life is mingled with it.

This is the love of God, an alchemy that can turn enemies into children.

The best dishes are often those to which the chef adds a personal statement, even when using a very old recipe. As Colette said, use a little alchemy

rumore di gatto, barba di donna, radici di montagna, tendini d'orso, respiro di pesce e sputo d'uccello.

Alchemy was (and is) considerably more than the attempt to turn base metals into gold. To an alchemist, all material things ripen toward perfection unless something gets in the way. The alchemist's mission is to remove the obstacles that keep material things from attaining their perfection. For metals, that perfection is gold; for the human body, health; for the human spirit, union with the divine-and all these and many more are appropriate goals for alchemical work.

Another very popular form of magic, now and for many centuries to follow, was the whole range of alchemy which had attached itself to the more purely mystical philosophy of early Daoism. The Way of the Daoists had been a method of transcending life, of getting in touch with some form of eternity beyond life. Among their humdrum successors this ideal often became lost in the more common quest for eternal life itself...

Scientific method seeks to understand things as they are, while alchemy seeks to bring about a desired state of affairs. To put it another way, the primary objective of science is truth, - that of alchemy, operational success.

My master,' said the servant quite loudly, 'is a student of that venerable and respected science of alchemy. A research scientist, you understand...