Biografier Over Historiske Okkultister

Hej alle!

Her er langt om længe, en lille biografi sektion over diverse berømte okkultister gennem historien, som jeg talte om for nogen tid siden i tråden "Portrætter af Berømte Okkultister". Som jeg nævnte i denne tråd, er der en del info, man kan give omkring disse yderst interessante personager, så det ville tage sin tid, hvis jeg selv skulle til at skrive en masse. Derfor har jeg simpelthen valgt at gengive information fra allerede eksisterende kilder. Kilden er angivet i bunden af hvert indlæg (en del af dem er fra Francis Barretts berømte værk The Magus). Dette betyder så også, at det meste er på engelsk, hvilket jeg beklager dybt, overfor de personer som muligvis kan have lidt problemer med sproget. Men spørg endelig, hvis der skulle være ting, nogen ikke forstår, og så kan vi jo arbejde på at sammen forklare og oversætte.

Håber ellers, I vil finde det interessant læsning. God fornøjelse!

Mange venlige hilsner,

Tesposinus

THE LIFE
OF
HENRY CORNELIUS AGRIPPA, KNIGHT,
DOCTOR OF BOTH LAWS, COUNSELLOR TO CHARLES V. EMPEROR OF GERMANY, AND JUDGE OF THE PREROGATIVE COURT.

HENRY CORNELIUS AGRIPPA, a very learned man and a magician, flourished in the sixteenth century. He was born at Cologne on the 14th of September, 1486. He descended from a noble and ancient family of Nettesheim. in Belgia; desiring to walk in the steps of his ancestors, who for many generations had been employed by the princes of the house of Austria, he entered early into the service of the Emperor Maximilian. He had at first the employ of Secretary; but as he was equally qualified for the sword as the pen, he afterwards turned soldier, and served the Emperor seven years in his Italian army. He signalized himself on several occasions, and as a reward of his brave actions he was created knight in the field. He wished to add the academical honours to the military, he therefore commenced doctor of laws and physic. He was a man possessed of a very wonderful genius, and from his youth applied his mind to learning, and by his great natural talents he obtained great knowledge in almost all arts and sciences. He was a diligent searcher into the mysteries of nature, and was early in search of the philosopher's stone; and it appears that he had been recommended to some princes as master of the art of alchymy, and very fit for the grand projection. He had a very extensive knowledge of things in general, as likewise in the learned languages. He was pupil to Trithemius, who wrote upon the nature, ministry, and offices of intelligences and spirits. He was of an unsettled temper, and often changed his situation, and was so unfortunate as to draw upon himself the indignation of the Popish clergy by his writings.

As to magic, in the sense it is understood by us, there is no doubt of his being a proficient in it, witness his three books of Occult Philosophy; to say nothing here of the fourth, which we have good authority to say was never wrote by Agrippa, as we shall shew presently, where we shall treat of the history of his Occult Philosophy.--In a word, to sum up the character of Agrippa we must do him the justice to acknowledge, that notwithstanding his impetuous temper which occasioned him many broils, yet from the letters which he wrote to several of his most intimate friends, without any apparent design of printing them, he was a man used to religious reflexions, and the practice of Christianity; that he was well versed in many of the chiefest and most secret operations of nature, viz. the sciences of natural and celestial magic; that he certainly performed strange things (in the vulgar eye) by the application of actives to passives, as which of us cannot? that he was an expert astrologer, physician, and mathematician, by which, as well as by magic, he foretold many uncommon things, and performed many admirable operations. John Wierus, who was his domestic, has given several curious and interesting anecdotes which throw great light upon the mysterious character of Agrippa, and serve to free him from the scandalous imputation of his being a professor of the BLACK ART. Now, because Agrippa continued whole weeks in his study, and yet was acquainted with almost every transaction in several countries of the world, many silly people gave out, that a black dog which Agrippa kept was an evil spirit, by whose means he had all this information, and which communicated the enemies' posts, number, designs, &c. to his master; this is Paul Jovius's account, by which you may see on what sort of reports he founded his opinions of this great man. We wonder that Gabriel Naudé had not the precaution to object to the accusers of Agrippa, the great number of historical falsehoods of which they (his accusers) stand convicted. Naudé supposes that the monks and others of the ecclesiastical order did not think of crying down the Occult Philosophy till a long time after it was published; he affirms that they exclaimed against that work, only in revenge for the injuries they believed they had received in that of the Vanity of the Sciences. 'Tis true, this latter book gave great offence to many. The monks, the members of the universities, the preachers, and the divines, saw themselves drawn to the life in it. Agrippa was of too warm a complexion. "The least taste of his book (of the Vanity of the Sciences) convinced me that he was an author of a fiery genius, extensive reading, and great memory; but sometimes more copious than choice in his subject, and writing in a disturbed, rather than in a composed, style." He lashes vice, and commends virtue, everywhere, and in every person: but there are some with whom nothing but panegyric will go down. See ERASMI Epist. lib. xxvii. p. 1083.

Let us now, in a few words, and for the conclusion of this article, describe the history of the Occult Philosophy. Agrippa composed this work in his younger days, and shewed it to the Abbot Trithemius, whose pupil he had been. Trithemius was charmed with it, as appears by the letter which he wrote to him on the 8th of April, 1510; but he advises him to communicate it only to those whom he could confide in. However, several manuscript copies of it were dispersed almost all over Europe. It is not necessary to observe that most of them were faulty, which never fails to happen in the like cases. They were preparing to print it from one of these bad copies; which made the author resolve to publish it himself, with the additions and alterations with which he had embellished it, after having shewed it to the Abbot Trithemius. Melchior Adam was mistaken in asserting that Agrippa, in his more advanced years, having corrected and enlarged this work, shewed it to the Abbot Trithemius. He had refuted his Occult Philosophy in his Vanity of the Sciences, and yet he published it to prevent others from printing a faulty and mutilated edition. He obtained the approbation of the doctors of divinity, and some other persons, whom the Emperor's council appointed to examine it.

"This book has been lately examined and approved by certain prelates of the church, and doctors, thoroughly versed both in sacred and profane literature, and by commissaries particularly deputed for that purpose by CÆSAR'S council: after which, it was admitted by the whole council, and licensed by the authentic diploma of his Imperial Majesty, and the stamp of the CÆSAREAN EAGLE in red wax; and was afterwards publicly printed and sold at ANTWERP, and then, at PARIS, without any opposition."

After the death of Agrippa a Fourth Book was added to it by another hand. Jo. Wierus de Magis, cap. 5. p. 108, says, "To these (books of Magic) may very justly be added, a work lately published, and ascribed to my late honoured host and preceptor, HENRY CORNELIUS AGRIPPA, who has been dead more than forty years; whence I conclude it is unjustly inscribed to his manes, under the title of THE FOURTH BOOK OF THE OCCULT PHILOSOPHY, OR OF MAGICAL CEREMONIES, which pretends likewise to be a Key to the three former books of the OCCULT PHILOSOPHY, and all kinds of Magical Operations." Thus John Wierus expresses himself; There is an edition in folio of the Occult Philosophy, in 1533, without the place where it was printed. The privilege of Charles V. is prefixed to it, dated from Mechlin, the 12th of January, 1529. We have already mentioned the chief works of Agrippa. It will be sufficient to add, that he wrote A Commentary on the Art of Raimundus Lullius and A Dissertation on the Original of Sin, wherein he teaches that the fall of our first parents proceeded from their unchaste love. He promised a work against the Dominicans, which would have pleased many persons both within and without the pale of the church of Rome 1. He held some uncommon opinions, and never any Protestant spoke more forcibly against the impudence of the Legendaries, than he did. We must riot forget the Key of his Occult Philosophy, which he kept only for his friends of the first rank, and explained it in a manner, which differs but little from the speculations of our Quietists. Now many suppose that the 4th book of the Occult Philosophy is the Key which Agrippa mentions in his letters to have reserved to himself; but it may be answered, with great shew of probability, that he amused the world with this Key to cause himself to be courted by the curious. James Gohory and Vigenere say, that he pretended to be master of the Practice of the Mirror of Pythagoras, and the secret of extracting the spirit of gold from its body, in order to convert silver and copper into fine gold. But he explains what he means by this Key, where he says, in the Epist. 19. lib. v.

"This is that true and occult philosophy of the wonders of nature. The key thereof is the understanding: for the higher we carry our knowledge, the more sublime are our attainments in virtue, and we perform the greatest things with more ease and effect."

Agrippa makes mention of this Key in two letters which he wrote to a religious who addicted himself to the study of the Occult Sciences, viz. Aurelius de Aqualpendente Austin, friar, where he says, "What surprising, accounts we meet with, and how great writings there are made of the invincible power of the Magic Art, of the prodigious images of Astrologers, of the amazing transmutations of Alchymists, and of that blessed stone by which, MIDAS-like, all metals are transmuted into gold: all which are found to be vain, fictitious, and false, as often as they are practised literally." Yet he says, "Such things it are delivered and writ by great and grave philosophers, whose traditions who dare say are false? Nay, it were impious to think them lies: only there is another meaning than what is writ with the bare letters. We must not, he adds, look for the principle of these grand operations without ourselves: it is an internal spirit within us, which can very well perform whatsoever the monstrous Mathematicians, the prodigious Magicians, the wonderful Alchymists, and the bewitching Necromancers, can effect."

Nos habitat, non tartara; sed nec sidera cœli,
Spiritus in nobis qui viget, illa facit.

See AGRIPPA Epist. dat. Lyons, Sept. 24, 1727.

Note. Agrippa's three books of Magic, with the fourth, were translated into English, and published in London in the year 1651. But they are now become so scarce, as very rarely to be met with, and are sold at a very high price by the booksellers.

NB: Jeg vil gerne lige gøre alle opmærksomme på, at denne biografi ikke er en komplet gengivelse, af hvad der var skrevet i The Magus, i og med den fulde biografi var for lang, så indlægget blev for stort. Derfor har jeg sprunget over en del, der ikke havde noget med hans okkulte baggrund at gøre. For at læse den komplette biografi, se venligst Barretts The Magus (udgivet af Red Wheel/Weiser).

PHILIPPUS AUREOLUS THEOPHRASTUS PARACELSUS BOMBAST DE HOENHEYM,
THE PRINCE OF PHYSICIANS AND PHILOSOPHERS BY FIRE;
GRAND PARADOXICAL PHYSICIAN;
THE TRISMEGISTUS OF SWITZERLAND;
FIRST REFORMER OF CHYMICAL PHILOSOPHY;
ADEPT IN ALCHYMY, CABALA, AND MAGIC;
NATURE'S FAITHFUL SECRETARY;
MASTER OF THE ELIXIR OF LIFE AND THE PHILOSOPHER'S STONE;
AND THE
GREAT MONARCH OF CHYMICAL SECRETS;
Now living in his Tomb, whither he retired disgusted with the Vices and Follies of Mankind, supporting himself with his own
QUINTESSENTIA VITÆ.

PARACELSUS was born, as he himself writes, in the year 1494, in a village in Switzerland called Hoenheym (q. d. ab alto nido) two miles distant from Zurich. His father was a natural son of a great master of the Teutonic order, and had been brought up to medicine, which he practised accordingly in that obscure corner. He was master of an excellent and copious library, and is said to have become eminent in his art, so that Paracelsus always speaks of him with the highest deference, and calls him laudatissimus medicus in eo vico. Of such a father did Paracelsus receive his first discipline. After a little course of study at home he was committed to the care of Trithemius, the celebrated abbot of Spanheim, who had the character of an adept himself, and wrote of the Cabala, being at that time a reputed magician. Here he chiefly learnt languages and letters; after which he was removed to Sigismund Fugger to learn medicine, surgery, and chymistry; all these masters, especially the last, Paracelsus ever speaks of with great veneration; so that he was not altogether so rude and unpolished as is generally imagined. Thus much we learn from his own writings, and especially the preface to his Lesser Surgery, where he defends himself against his accusers. At twenty years of age he undertook a journey through Germany and Hungary, visiting all the mines of principal note, and contracting an acquaintance with the miners and workmen, by which means he learnt every thing, relative to metals, and the art thereof: in this enquiry he shewed an uncommon assiduity and resolution. He gives us an account of the many dangers he had run from earthquakes, falls of stones, floods of water, cataracts, exhalations, damps, heat, hunger, and thirst; and every where takes occasion to insist on the value of an art acquired on such hard terms. The same inclination carried him as far as Muscovy, where as he was in quest of mines near the frontiers of Tartary he was taken prisoner by that people, and carried before the great Cham; during his captivity there he learnt various secrets, till, upon the Cham's sending an embassy to the Grand Signior, with his own son at the head of it, Paracelsus was sent along with him in quality of companion. On this occasion he came to Constantinople in the twenty-eighth year of his age, and was there taught the secret of the philosopher's stone by a generous Arabian, who made him this noble present, as he calls it, Azoth. This incident we have from Helmont only; for Paracelsus himself, who is ample enough on his other travels, says nothing of his captivity. At his return from Turkey he practised as a surgeon in the Imperial army, and performed many excellent cures therein; indeed, it cannot be denied but that he was excellent in that art, of which his great surgery, printed in folio, will ever be a standing monument. At his return to his native country he assumed the title of utriusque medicinæ doctor, or doctor both of external and internal medicine or surgery; and grew famous in both, performing far beyond what the practice of that time could pretend to; and no wonder, for medicine was then in a poor condition; the practice and the very language was all Galenical and Arabic; nothing was inculcated but Aristotle, Galen, and the Arabs; Hippocrates was not read; nay, there was no edition of his writings, and scarce was he ever mentioned. Their theory consisted in the knowledge of the four degrees, the temperaments, &c. and their whole practice was confined to venesection, purgation, vomiting, clysmata, &c. Now, in this age a new disease had broke out, and spread itself over Europe, viz. the venereal disorder; the common Galenic medicines had here proved altogether ineffectual; bleeding, purging, and cleansing medicines were vain; and the physicians were at their wit's end. Jac Carpus, a celebrated anatomist and surgeon at Bolonge, had alone been master of the cure, which was by mercury administered to raise a salivation; he had attained this secret in his travels through Spain and Italy, and practised it for some years, and with such success and applause, that it is incredible what immense riches this one nostrum brought him (it is said upon good authority, that in one year he cleared six thousand pistoles) he acknowledged himself, that he did not know the end of his own wealth; for the captains, merchants, governors, commanders, &c. who had brought that filthy disease from America, were very well content to give him what sums he pleased to ask to free them from it.--Paracelsus about this time having likewise learnt the properties of mercury, and most likely from Carpus, who undertook the same cure but in a very different manner; for whereas Carpus did all by salivation--Paracelsus making up his preparation in pills attained his ends in a gentler manner. By this he informs us he cured the itch, leprosy, ulcers, Naples disease, and even gout, all which disorders were incurable on the foot of popular practice, and thus was the great basis laid for all his future fame and fortune.

Paracelsus, thus furnished with arts, and arrived at a degree of eminence beyond any of his brothers in the profession, was invited by the curators of the university of Bazil to the chair of professor of medicine and philosophy in that university. The art of printing was now a new thing, the taste for learning and art was warm, and the magistracy of Bazil were very industrious in procuring professors of reputation from all parts of the world. They had already got Desid. Erasmus, professor of theology, and J. Oporinus professor of the Greek tongue; and now in 1527 Paracelsus was associated in the 33d year of his age. Upon his first entrance into that province, having to make a public speech before the university, he posted up a very elegant advertisement over the doors inviting every body to his doctrine. At his first lecture he ordered a brass vessel to be brought into the middle of the school, where after he had cast in sulphur and nitre, in a very solemn manner he burnt the books of Galen and Avicenna, alledging that he had held a dispute with them in the gates of hell, and had fairly routed and overcome them. And hence he proclaimed, that the physicians should all follow him; and no longer style themselves Galenists, but Paracelsists.--"Know," says he, "physicians, my cap has more learning in it than all your heads, my beard has more experience than your whole academies: Greeks, Latins, French, Germans, Italians, I will be your king."

While he was here professor he read his book De Tartaro, de Gradibus, and De compsitionibus, in public lectures, to which he added a commentary on the book De Gradibus; all these he afterwards printed at Bazil for the use of his disciples; so that these must be allowed for genuine writings; about the same time he wrote De Calculo, which performance Helmont speaks of with high approbation.

Notwithstanding his being professor in so learned an university he understood but a very little Latin; his long travels, and application to business, and disuse of the language, had very much disqualified him for writing or speaking therein; and his natural warmth rendered him very unfit for teaching at all. Hence, though his auditors and disciples were at first very numerous, yet they very much fell off, and left him preaching to the walls. In the mean time he abandoned himself to drinking at certain seasons; Oporinus, who was always near him, has the good nature to say, he was never sober; but that he tippled on from morning to night, and from night to morning, in a continual round. At length he soon became weary of his professorship, and after three years continuance therein relinquished it, saying, that no language besides the German was proper to reveal the secrets of chymistry in.

After this he again betook himself to an itinerant life, travelling and drinking, and living altogether at inns and taverns, continually flushed with liquor, and yet working many admirable cures in his way. In this manner he passed four years from the 43d to the 47th year of his life, when he died at an inn at Saltzburg, at the sign of the White Horse, on a bench in the chimney-corner. Oporinus relates, that after he had put on any new thing, it never came off his back till he had worn it into rags; he adds, that notwithstanding his excess in point of drinking, he was never addicted to venery.--But there is this reason for it: when he was a child, being neglected by his nurse, a hag gelded him in a place where three ways met, and so made a eunuch of him; accordingly in his writings he omits no opportunity of railing against women.--Such is the life of Paracelsus; such is the immortal man, who sick of life retired into a corner of the world, and there supports himself with his own Quintessence of Life.

In his life time he only published three or four books, but after his death he grew prodigiously voluminous, scarce a year passing but one book or other was published under his name, said to be found in some old wall, ceiling, or the like. All the works published under his name were printed together at Strasburg in the year 1603, in three volumes folio, and again in 1616. J. Oporinus, that excellent professor and printer, before named, who constantly attended Paracelsus for three years as his menial servant, in hopes of learning some of his secrets, who published the works of Vesalius, and is supposed to have put them in that elegant language wherein they now appear: this Oporinus, in an epistle to Monavius, concerning the life of Paracelsus, professes himself surprized to find so many works of his master; for, that in all the time he was with him never wrote a word himself, nor ever took pen in hand, but forced Oporinus to write what he dictated; and Oporinus wondered much how such coherent words and discourse which might even become the wisest persons, should come from the mouth of a drunken man. His work called Archidoxa Medicinæ, as containing the principles and maxims of the art, nine books of which were published at first; and the author in the prolegomena to them, speaks thus:--"I intended to have published my ten books of Archidoxa; but finding mankind unworthy of such a treasure as the tenth, I keep it close, and have firmly resolved never to bring it thence, till you have all abjured ARISTOTLE, AVICEN, and GALEN, and have sworn allegiance to PARACELSUS alone."

However, the book did at length get abroad, though by what means is not known; it is undoubtedly an excellent piece, and may be ranked among the principal productions in the way, of chymistry, that have ever appeared; whether or no it be Paracelsus's we cannot affirm, but there is one thing speaks in its behalf, viz. it contains a great many things which have since been trumped up for great nostrums; and Van Helmont's Lithonthriptic and Alcahest are apparently taken from hence; among the genuine writings of Paracelsus are likewise reckoned, that De Ortu Rerum Naturalium, De Transformatione Rerum Naturalium, and De Vita Rerunt Naturalium. The rest are spurious or very doubtful, particularly his theological works.

The great fame and success of this man, which many attribute to his possessing an universal medicine may be accounted for from other principles. It is certain he was well acquainted with the use and virtue of opium, which the Galenists of those times all rejected as cold in the fourth degree. Oporinus relates that he made up certain little pills of the colour, figure, and size of mouse-turds, which were nothing but opium. These he called by a barbarous sort of name, his laudanum; q. d. laudable medicine; he always carried them with him, and prescribed them in dyssenteries, and all cases attended with intense pains, anxieties, deliriums, and obstinate wakings; but to be alone possessed of the use of so extraordinary and noble a medicament as opium, was sufficient to make him famous.

Another grand remedy with Paracelsus was turbith mineral; this is first mentioned in his Clein Spital Boeck, or Chirurgia Minor, where he gives the preparation. In respect of the philosopher's stone.--Oporinus says, he often wondered to see him one day without a farthing in his pocket, and the next day, full of money; that he took nothing with him when he went abroad. He adds, that he would often borrow money of his companions, the carmen and porters, and pay it again in twenty-four hours with extravagant interest, and yet from what fund nobody but himself knew. In the Theatrum Alchemiæ he mentions a treasure, hid under a certain tree; and from such like grounds they supposed him to possess the art of making gold; but it was hard if such noble nostrums as he possessed would not subsist him without the lapis philosophorum.

Biografiens kilde: Francis Barretts The Magus (udgivet af Red Wheel/Weiser).

ELIPHAS LEVI - ALPHONSE LOUIS CONSTANT

Eliphas Lévi, born Alphonse Louis Constant, (February 8, 1810 - May 31, 1875) was a French occult author and magician.

"Eliphas Lévi," the name under which he published his books, was his attempt to translate or transliterate his given names "Alphonse Louis" into Hebrew.

Lévi was the son of a shoemaker in Paris; he attended a seminary and began to study to enter the Roman Catholic priesthood. However, while at the seminary he fell in love, and left without being ordained. He wrote a number of minor religious works: Des Moeurs et des Doctrines du Rationalisme en France ("Of the Moral Customs and Doctrines of Rationalism in France", 1839) was a tract within the cultural stream of the Counter-Enlightenment. La Mère de Dieu ("The Mother of God", 1844) followed and, after leaving the seminary, two radical tracts, L'Evangile du Peuple ("The Gospel of the People," 1840), and Le Testament de la Liberté ("The Testament of Liberty"), published in the year of revolutions, 1848, led to two brief prison sentences.

In 1854, Lévi visited England, where he met the novelist Edward Bulwer-Lytton, who was interested in Rosicrucianism as a literary theme and was the president of a minor Rosicrucian order. With Bulwer-Lytton, Lévi conceived the notion of writing a treatise on magic. This appeared in 1855 under the title Dogme et Rituel de la Haute Magie, and was translated into English by Arthur Edward Waite as Transcendental Magic, its Doctrine and Ritual. Its famous opening lines present the single essential theme of Occultism and gives some of the flavor of its atmosphere:

Behind the veil of all the hieratic and mystical allegories of ancient doctrines, behind the darkness and strange ordeals of all initiations, under the seal of all sacred writings, in the ruins of Nineveh or Thebes, on the crumbling stones of old temples and on the blackened visage of the Assyrian or Egyptian sphinx, in the monstrous or marvelous paintings which interpret to the faithful of India the inspired pages of the Vedas, in the cryptic emblems of our old books on alchemy, in the ceremonies practised at reception by all secret societies, there are found indications of a doctrine which is everywhere the same and everywhere carefully concealed. (Introduction)

In 1861, he published a sequel, La Clef des Grands Mystères (The Key to the Great Mysteries). Further magical works by Lévi include Fables et Symboles (Stories and Images), 1862, and La Science des Esprits (The Science of Spirits), 1865. In 1868, he wrote Le Grand Arcane, ou l'Occultisme Dévoilé (The Great Secret, or Occultism Unveiled); this, however, was only published posthumously in 1898.

Lévi's version of magic became a great success, especially after his death. That Spiritualism was popular on both sides of the Atlantic from the 1850s contributed to this success. His magical teachings were free from obvious fanaticisms, even if they remained rather murky; he had nothing to sell, and did not pretend to be the inititate of some ancient or fictitious secret society. He incorporated the Tarot cards into his magical system, and as a result the Tarot has been an important part of the paraphernalia of Western magicians. He had a deep impact on the magic of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn and later on the ex-Golden Dawn member Aleister Crowley. It was largely through the occultists inspired by him that Lévi is remembered as one of the key founders of the twentieth century revival of magic.

In Crowley's autobiography The Confessions of Aleister Crowley — published as non-fiction but now recognised as containing many fabrications — Crowley claimed to be the reincarnation of Eliphas Lévi and offered as evidence the statement that Crowley was born shortly after Lévi died. Crowley was born October 12, 1875, slightly less than six months after Lévi's death, meaning he was in the womb when Lévi died. However, since the soul is believed by many to incarnate, not at the moment of conception, but, rather, at some time during gestation, or even as late as the moment of birth (incidentally, the time chosen for the drawing of the native's horoscope), the fact that Crowley's body was in the womb at the time of Levi's death does not necessarily pose any objection to his claim.

Levi identified three fundamental principles of magic:[1]

1. That the material universe is only a small part of total reality, which includes many other planes and modes of consciousness. Full knowledge and full power in the universe are only attainable through awareness of these other aspects of reality. One of the most important of these levels or aspects of reality is the "astral light", a cosmic fluid which may be molded by will into physical forms.
2. That human willpower is a real force, capable of achieving absolutely anything, from the mundane to the miraculous.
3. That the human being is a microcosm, a miniature of the macrocosmic universe, and the two are fundamentally linked. Causes set in motion on one level may equally have effects on another.

Denne biografi er blot taget fra Wikipedia, da jeg syntes, den var ganske glimrende, kort og lige på. Der er dog meget mere at fortælle om Levi og hans involvering i magi, men var det her ikke fint nok?

Engelsk lærd og okkultist der var aktiv i 1801-1802. Der vides meget lidt om denne ellers vigtige engelske magiker, hvis magi manual fra 1801, The Magus, spillede en yderst vigtig rolle i magiens genoplivelse i det 19. århundrede. Det vides, at han levede i Marylebone i London, og havde ry for at være en excentriker.

I hans bog inviterede han op til tolv elever til at kontakte ham via en annonce og påbegynde træning i okkult teori og praksis.

The Author of this Work respectfully informs those that are curious in the studies of Art and Nature, especially of Natural and Occult Philosophy, Chemistry, Astrology, etc., etc., that, having been indefatigable in his researches in those sublime Sciences; of which he has treated at large in this book, that he gives private instructions and lectures upon any of the above-mentioned Sciences; in the course of which he will discover many curious and rare experiments.
Those who become Students will be initiated into the choicest operations of Natural Philosophy, Natural Magic, the Cabbala, Chemistry, the Talismanic Arts, Hermetic Philosophy, Astrology, Physiognomy, etc., etc. Likewise they will acquire the knowledge of the Rites, Mysteries, Ceremonies and Principles of the ancient Philosophers, Magi, Cabbalists, and Adepts, etc.
The Purpose of this school (which will consist of no greater number than Twelve Students) being to investigate the hidden treasures of Nature; to bring the Mind to a contemplation of the Eternal Wisdom; to promote the discovery of whatever may conduce to the perfection of Man; the alleviating the miseries and calamities of this life, both in respect of ourselves and others; the study of morality and religion here, in order to secure to ourselves felicity hereafter; and, finally, the promulgation of whatever may conduce to the general happiness and welfare of mankind.

Mindst én person ved man, blev en sådan elev - en vis Dr. John Parkins fra Grantham, Lincolnshire. Et overlevende brev fra Barrett til Parkins giver detaljerede instruktioner i at scry med en krystal, og giver Parkins muligheden for at blive indviet i "de højeste mysterier i de Rosencreuziske discipliner".

Som skrevet i Barretts billedsektion, så betragtes hans bog desværre ofte som et plagiat af Agrippas Three Books of Occult Philosophy, hvilket på ingen måde var tilfældet, idet Barrett blot reproducerede de bedste okkulte materialer, han havde kendskab til, og Agrippas tekst (samt grimoirerne Heptameron af Pietro de Abano, The Art of Drawing Spirits into Crystals af Johannes Trithemius samt andre værker) var deriblandt.

Den berømte okkultist, Eliphas Levi, var under stærk inflydelse af The Magus og derved ligeledes også senere okkultister som S.L. MacGregor Mathers og William Wynn Westcott.

Kilden til denne biografi var bl.a. John Michael Greers bog The New Encyclopedia of the Occult, og almen viden om Francis Barrett.