treatise on educating an homunculus part three

Probably everyone has had the experience of having an inspirational moment. Maybe it was a workshop or conference, maybe it was the birth of a child, maybe it was a great book you read–we’ve all felt how great it feels to experience inspiration (L. in, into + spirare, spirat–, to breathe). But how long does [...]

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treatise on educating an homunculus with zeal: part 2

Paracelsus says that to make a “little man” who can do your bidding, one must mix together semen and horse manure and let it putrify for forty weeks. My last statement in TOEAHWZ: part 1 was a thinly veiled metaphor describing the connection between 1.) birthing a little man out of carefully tended but powerfully [...]

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treatise on educating an homunculus with great zeal, part one

Recap: Paracelsus, an alchemist/physician/knave of the fifteenth century, explained how one goes about making an homunculous: Let the semen of a man putrefy  by itself in a sealed cucurbite [glass vessel] with the highest putrefaction of the venter equinus [horse manure] for forty days, or until it begins at last to live, move, and be [...]

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“Decay is the midwife of very great things…” Paracelsus

Paracelsus was an alchemist and physician from the 1400′s. He was a very unusual character, accused of being a drunkard and and a knave by many upstanding citizens in many countries in and about Europe. He happens to be one of my favorite characters, mostly because he said that you can make a “little man”–a [...]

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