The alchemy of crystals

DEEP DOWN AT THE HEART of the atom something is growing, something is being transformed and re-organised into a new and crystalline beauty. Baked by the fierce fires of the alchemist’s crucible, gross matter is turning into gold, or the magical elixir of life.

This age-old quest of the alchemists demanded such discipline, such awareness from its practitioners that by the time the longed-for crystals might have appeared in their vessels, the gross matter of their minds too would have been transformed by the work. The harmony of the emerging crystalline form reflects the harmony that his meditation has brought to the alchemist’s own being. And no crystal could form if the alchemist’s mind remained impure, for ultimately he and his crucible were not two.