PREFACE TO THE KING

...are considered, most Great King, and very many teach them mysteries by the most absolute Anagogy original: Anagogia. This refers to a method of spiritual or mystical interpretation that finds hidden, higher meanings in text or symbols.. But having dismissed, in this way, those Philosophers of Letters and Language; I shall bring forward my MATHEMATICIANS as the most sincere witnesses of this rarity of our Gift.

1. 2. Will not the ARITHMETICIAN (I do not say a mere CALCULATOR original: Logista. In the Renaissance, a "logista" was a common reckoner or accountant, whereas an "arithmetician" studied the philosophical and theoretical nature of numbers.) wonder that his numbers—which he used to hide in the deep recesses of thought original: Dianœas. Referring to the discursive intellect or the process of reasoning. as things abstracted from physical objects and free from all sensible things—are here, in our work, shown and made as if they were concrete and physical? And will he not wonder that their Souls and Formal lives are separated from them for our use?

2. Will he not marvel most of all to see such a great offspring of the MONAD original: Monadis. The "Monad" is the number one, representing unity, God, and the source of all things.: to which no other Monad or Number is added, nor can anything from the outside be applied to Multiply it?

3. Will he not be moved by the greatest admiration for the most subtle and General Rule of the Thing and its Value original: Rei & Census. In early algebra, the "Res" (the Thing) and "Census" (the Power/Square) were technical terms for the unknown variable and its square.: where ONE THING, proposed as a kind of Chaos (fit for dissolving every Arithmetical doubt), has its very Value and worth—or the estimation of the Power lying hidden in the THING itself—explained here, in the First Examination, always by the number TEN original: Denario Numero. Dee is suggesting that his symbol reveals a fundamental decimal structure in the universe, where the "one" relates to the "ten."? After first employing the accurate works of Division and Equation (or as that Art prescribes)?

3. The GEOMETER (my King) will begin to hesitate, finding that the Principles of his own art are scarcely fully established (which is a very wonderful thing): when he understands that it is whispered and hinted at here, in Secret, that a SQUARE is shown to be entirely Equal to a CIRCLE through the mystery of this Hieroglyphic MONAD. Dee is claiming that his symbol provides the solution to "squaring the circle," one of the most famous and difficult problems in ancient geometry, which was thought to be impossible by traditional means.