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True and False Alchemy - Paul Ferguson - 04-24-2026
True Alchemy and The False Alchemy Invented By Freemasons: Historiographical Deconstruction of Speculative Hermeticism
By Ivan Paduano
"This academic essay analyzes, through the lens of modern the history of science and Western esotericism, the complex and paradoxical relationship between historical alchemy, a discipline based on rigorous laboratory practice, known as chrysopoeia and forerunner of modern chemistry, and the so-called "spiritual alchemy", an allegorical superstructure devoid of any empirical implication. The central nucleus and the provocative thesis of this study revolve around a fundamental historiographical misunderstanding: what in the contemporary imagination is widely and erroneously considered as the "true" alchemy, understood as a purely interior, psychological and theurgical path, is actually a "false" and retrospective invention."
https://www.academia.edu/165870289/True_Alchemy_and_The_False_Alchemy_Invented_By_Freemasons_Historiographical_Deconstruction_of_Speculative_Hermeticism