RAMON LULL

original: "Raymundi Lulli"; the Latinized name of the Majorcan philosopher and mystic

...they wish. And those things which I have formed by the permission of God and my master, they wish to drive me to my death. This is the grief which the Lady Nature spoke before her priest: "I groan and I mourn." And truly she wept so deeply that there was no heart witnessing her that was not moved to compassion, or held back from weeping out of love for her. For the pain of her body was so great that she was driven even to a convulsion original: "spasmum"; a physical contraction or seizure caused here by extreme emotional and spiritual distress because of the sorrow and displeasure she felt regarding the good works she had performed in this world. Indeed, she wished to abandon those works and no longer cared to perform them, provided she could obtain permission from God her master, having petitioned Him on the matter.

And because of this, we have received a mandate original: "mandatum"; a formal commission or divine instruction that we must keep her instruments secret and guard them from the hands of her enemies. All these things we shall explain in the second book, if you are capable of entering into it. Therefore, this first book is divided and partitioned into five parts and five divisions, through general chapters.

Since, however, the practice original: "practica"; the hands-on application of alchemy of this part of philosophy cannot be taught without the theory original: "theorica"; the underlying principles and intellectual framework preceding it, we say that the theory is contained in that part which deals with the dispositions of transmutable original: "transmutabilium"; substances capable of being changed from one state or metal into another and changeable bodies toward a balanced state...