*
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* If the "English F.T.S." would take the trouble of consulting p. 11 of
the "Magia Adamica" of Eugenius Philalethes, his learned compatriot, he
would find therein the difference between a visible and an invisible
planet is clearly hinted at as it was safe to do at a time when the iron
claw of orthodoxy had the power as well as disposition to tear the flesh
from heretic bones. "The earth is invisible," says he, .... "and which
is more, the eye of man never saw the earth, nor can it be seen
without art. To make this element visible is the greatest secret in
magic .... As for this feculent, gross body upon which we walk, it is
a compost, and no earth but it hath earth in it .... in a word, all the
elements are visible but one, namely, the earth: and when thou hast
attained to so much perfection as to know why God hath placed the earth
in abscondito, thou hast an excellent figure whereby to know God
himself, and how he is visible, how invisible," The italics are the
author's, it being the custom of the Alchemists to emphasize those words
which had a double meaning in their code.
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