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MAGIC IN INTELLECTUAL HISTORY

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the Middle Ages.^[1] Several such alchemical treatises are still extant; and writings on astrological medicine and the magical powers of gems, plants and animals have also come down to us under Hermes' name.^[2]

Some of the supposed writings of Hermes were mystical rather than magical; for instance, the famous Poemander^[3] which consists mainly of brief and disconnected utterances concerning God and the human soul and other subjects of a religious character. Still, one does not have to read far into its sixteen "books" before finding evidence of belief in astrology, of the mysticism of number and of an esoteric view of knowledge. It tells us "to avoid all conversation with the multitude" and to "take heed of them as not understanding the virtue and power of the things that are said." It speaks frequently of the seven circles of heaven, the seven zones, and the seven "Governors." It affirms that "the

↑ See article on "Hermes" in La Grande Encyclopédie by Berthelot who has made an extended study of the history of aldhemy; and who, in his La Chimie au Moyen Age holds that Greek alchemistic treatises were continuously extant in Italy during the Dark Ages—a circumstance which diminishes the importance of Arabian influence on the study of the hermetic art in the later Middle Ages.
↑ See Anthon's Classical Dictionary, 1855 (no adequate account of Hermes Trismegistus exists in any of the more recent classical dictionaries).
↑ The Poemander (or Pymander) has been reproduced in the Bath Occult Reprint Series (London, 1884) from the translation "from the Arabic by Dr. Everard, 1650." It has an introduction by Hargrave Jennings, "author of the Rosicrucians," giving some account of Hermes Trismegistus. Vol. ii in the same Bath Occult Reprint Series—which seems to have been instituted on behalf of "students of the occult sciences, searchers after truth and Theosophists"—is Hermes’ Virgin of the World. Besides Berthelot's article, an account of Hermes may be found in pages 181-190 of The Literary Remains of the late Emanuel Deutsch (London, 1879). There is a French translation of the Poemander by Menard with an introductory essay which, however, Deutsdi characterized as "deplorably shallow."

[1] See article on "Hermes" in La Grande Encyclopédie by Berthelot who has made an extended study of the history of aldhemy; and who, in his La Chimie au Moyen Age holds that Greek alchemistic treatises were continuously extant in Italy during the Dark Ages—a circumstance which diminishes the importance of Arabian influence on the study of the hermetic art in the later Middle Ages.

[2] See Anthon's Classical Dictionary, 1855 (no adequate account of Hermes Trismegistus exists in any of the more recent classical dictionaries).

[3] The Poemander (or Pymander) has been reproduced in the Bath Occult Reprint Series (London, 1884) from the translation "from the Arabic by Dr. Everard, 1650." It has an introduction by Hargrave Jennings, "author of the Rosicrucians," giving some account of Hermes Trismegistus. Vol. ii in the same Bath Occult Reprint Series—which seems to have been instituted on behalf of "students of the occult sciences, searchers after truth and Theosophists"—is Hermes’ Virgin of the World. Besides Berthelot's article, an account of Hermes may be found in pages 181-190 of The Literary Remains of the late Emanuel Deutsch (London, 1879). There is a French translation of the Poemander by Menard with an introductory essay which, however, Deutsdi characterized as "deplorably shallow."

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