The fifteen plates of the Mutus Liber "the Mute Book," are well known, and this book without words is recognized as a classic of the seventeenth-century alchemical tradition. Although the engravings seem to outline an alchemical process in detail, their message is not immediately obvious and it really requires a commentary to make it intelligible to the present-day reader. Adam McLean's extensive commentary on this series of engravings reveals the Mutus Liber as a synthesis of spiritual, soul, and physical alchemy. While the entire secret of the physical process is not fully revealed in the plates, enough information is given to piece together details of a modus operandi/ indeed, modern French alchemists like Canseliet and Barbault have found great inspiration and hints relating to the physical work in the Mutus Liber. As one of the most significant documents of the alchemical tradition, this edition of the Mutus Liber will be appreciated by all students of the Hermetic tradition, for Adam McLean's fascinating and insightful commentary throws a penetrating light on both the spiritual and physical dimensions of the Great Work.

The Mutus Liber is an epistemological treatise. The alchemical laboratory is the mind. In it, thoughts are chemical compounds and their processes are reactions producing knowledge. The operation works on the mind. The alchemical transmutation takes place in the mind, by the mind and through the mind in all its stages, conscious, subconscious, unconscious and beyond. Therefore, the key to interpret the plates and to open the mouth of the Mute Book is gnoseological. The chemical elements, consequently, are only metaphors to describe the epistemic process.

ALCHEMY AND ITS MUTE BOOK. In the year of foundation in 2010, we published Br. Magaphon’s commentary on the Mutus Liber – the Book Without Words. This year we offer commentary on the Mutus Liber from Magaphon’s friend and associate: Eugène Canseliet. Canseliet had a most pivotal role in the transmission of the alchemical tradition in Europe in the 20th century. Canseliet may not quite touch upon the innermost secrets of the book, as becomes obvious from the preface of Br. Exoslius, yet this book still offers a most formidable insight in the Visual Language of the Alchemists of old.

Mandalas have long been recognized in Eastern spiritual traditions as important tools for focusing meditation. Though various Western traditions possess such contemplative tools, they have not often been recognized as such. McLean remedies this by presenting, and analyzing in great depth, over forty beautiful engravings, reproduced as full-page illustrations, from alchemical, kabbalistic, magical, Rosicrucian, and Hermetic sources. This second edition of the first book exclusively dedicated to the mandala tradition in the West is an extremely valuable sourcework for its illustrations and commentaries. Not only is it a comprehensive guide to reading the cosmological and spiritual symbolism of alchemical engravings, it also outlines three ways for working with these mandalas as spiritual exercises.

Alchemy and the quest for the Philosopher's Stone have been a strand in the development of European culture from antiquity onwards. With the spread of printing, the whole fantastic iconography flowered as never before. This fascinating book presents a selection of the finest alchemical engravings, brought together for the first time, and describes their origins and meanings. 533 illustrations.

A classic, prize-winning novel about an epic migration and a lone woman haunted by the past in frontier Waipu. In the 1850s, a group of settlers established a community at Waipu in the northern part of New Zealand. They were led there by a stern preacher, Norman McLeod. The community had followed him from Scotland in 1817 to found a settlement in Nova Scotia, then subsequently to New Zealand via Australia. Their incredible journeys actually happened, and in this winner of the New Zealand Book Awards, Fiona Kidman breathes life and contemporary relevance into the facts by creating a remarkable fictional story of three women entangled in the migrations - Isabella, her daughter Annie and granddaughter Maria. McLeod's harsh leadership meant that anyone who ran counter to him had to live a life of secrets. The 'secrets' encapsulated the spirit of these women in their varied reactions to McLeod's strict edicts and connect the past to the present and future.