『천국과 지옥의 결혼』의 연금술적 요소

Abstract

The transformation of base metals into the gold is what all alchemists pursue. With the dream of getting philosopher’s stone they endeavored to unite the sulphur and the mercury, which symbolize male and female, soul and material, or fire and water, respectively. In alchemical texts, this union is always expressed as a term, “marriage” which Blake borrowed for his major poem, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell. Therefore, it is natural that The Marriage of Heaven and Hell says “without contraries is no progression.” In view of the alchemical concepts, progression does not mean going forward but ascending. In the Blake’s myth, Albion, a ‘universal man’, falls along with his own division. Blake thought that the divided must ascend as much as they fell. Blake consistently described the efforts to restore the orignal unity in his latter epics such as The Four Zoas, Milton, and Jerusalem. The circle of destiny consists of ‘ascending’ and ‘falling.’ Los, the symbol of imagination, labours to reunite the divided world. He is a blacksmith who uses the furnace, which is the place for the purification and the reunion of opposites. So we can say the Blake’s basic concept of his own myth corresponds to the alchemist’s view of the world.