rors. The study, although difficult,
holds him fast. He cannot turn back (Sec. 1). So he pursues his aim still
further (Sec. 2) and thinks he has now found the right authorities (Sec.
3) that can admit him to the college of wisdom. But the people are not at
one with each other. They also employ figurative language that obscures
the true doctrine, and which, contrasted with practice, is of no value. (I
mention incidentally that the great masters of the hermetic art are
accustomed to impress on the reader that he is not to cling to their words
but measure things always according to nature and her possibilities.) The
elders promise him indeed the revelation of important doctrines but are
not willing to communicate the beginning of the work (Sec. 5, 6,
preparation for the fight with the lion). That is a rather amusing trait
of hermetic literature.

We have come to the fight with the lion, which takes place in a den. The
wanderer kills the lion and takes out of him red blood and white bones,
therefore red and white. Red and white enter later as roses, then as man
and woman.

I cite now several passages from different alchemistic books.

Hohler (Herm. Phil., p. 91) says, apparently after Michael Meiers,
"Septimana Philosophica": "The green lion [a usual symbol for the material
at the beginning] encloses the raw seeds, yellow hairs adorn his head
[this detail is not lacking in the parable], i.e., when the projection on
the metals takes place, they turn yellow, golden." [Green is the color of
hope, of growth. Previously only the head of the lion is gold, his future.
Later he becomes a red lion, the philosopher's stone, the king in robe of
purple. At any rate he must first be killed.]

The lion that must die is the dragon, which the dragon fighter kills. Thus
we have seen it in the mythological parallel. Psychoanalysis shows us
further that lion = dragon = father (= parents, etc.). It is now very
interesting that the alchemistic symbolism interchanges the same forms. We
shall see that again.

Berthelot cites (Orig. de l'Alch., p. 60) from an old manuscript: "The
dragon is the guardian of the temple. Sacrifice it, flay it, separate the
flesh from the bones, and you will find what you seek."

The dragon is, as can be shown out of the old authors, also the snake that
bites its own tail or which on the other hand can also be represented by
two snakes.

Flamel writes on the hieroglyphic figure of two dragons (in the 3d chapter