Aula Lucis (The House of Light)

by · thomas vaughan

With new Introduction by
thomas willard

¶ For the fourth volume in the Mysterium Hermeticum series we have brought together a pair of treatises which are unique in the history of alchemical literature. Lumen de Lumine and Aula Lucis were meant to be published in one book, about the year 1651. Why this intended design did not come to fruition, Thomas Willard expounds in his excellent introductory essay. What is certain is that both of these tracts offer a profound insight into the Alchemy of Light and the Mysterium Magnum itself: the Prima Materia. It is therefore our pleasure to join together in one volume what was once put asunder, and thus honour the original design of the author, of whom we shall speak presently.

¶ Next to Robert Fludd, the Welsh alchemist Thomas Vaughan (1621–1666), also known as Eugenius Philalethes, has been widely regarded as Britain’s most notable 17th century occultist and alchemical writer. He is believed to be one of the most profound and perhaps most recondite of all visionaries who have seen “the new East beyond the stars.” His magical and alchemical writings, published in the 1650s, established him as a leading interpreter of the Secret Tradition in his time. Aside from being a passionate exponent of alchemy, Vaughan was a mystical philosopher and a visionary largely influenced by the Rosicrucian movement of the 17th century. He translated and published the first English edition of the Rosicrucian Manifestos, Fama and Confessio Fraternitatis, alongside many of their lesser known works, such as “A Letter from the Brothers of R.C. Concerning the Invisible, Magical Mountain, & the Treasure therein Contained,” which he inserted into Lumen de Lumine.

¶ Far from being only a speculative philosopher, Vaughan was also a practicing alchemist whose penetrating insight into the mysteries of Nature was tried and tested in the light of laboratory experience. Thus in Lumen de Lumine, by means of an allegoric dream-vision, he introduces the reader to the secret School of Magic in which Thalia—the spirit of Nature—unfolds before the alchemist the cascade of First Matter and its various mineral and metallic generations. These are symbolically represented by the engraved Emblem of the School, created by the celebrated 17th-century artist Robert Vaughan and reproduced in the book. Following this, Vaughan adds eleven short essays, ranging in length from four sentences to fourteen small pages of text. All concern aspects of the alchemical work in both the practical sense—from the First Matter to the projection—and in the expanded sense including Magic and Cabala. The “Magical Aphorisms of Eugenius” which follow are elucidated by a commentary written exclusively for this edition by Prof. Thomas Willard.

¶ “I have resolved with myself to discourse of Light, and to deliver it over to posterity,” writes Thomas Vaughan in the opening lines of Aula Lucis. In this luminous essay, which follows chronologically after Lumen de Lumine, he explains what the descent of Light into Matter truly means for anyone who wishes to have a better understanding of Nature, and especially for the prospective alchemist. At its heart, his thesis concerns not only the regeneration of metals, but the spiritual transmutation of Man. He writes: “He that desires to be happy, let him look after Light, for it is the Cause of Happiness, both temporal and eternal. In the House thereof it may be found, and the House is not far off nor hard to find, for the Light walks in before us and is the Guide to his own habitation.” We invite our readers to follow us on this journey into the House of Light, where our quest for the First Matter of the Philosophers shall continue in earnest.