A theurgist performing rituals to exercise divine powers on earth. Coloured aquatint.

Date:
[between 1800 and 1899]
Reference:
47025i
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Description

A night scene. A circle is drawn on the ground and inscribed with sacred names and symbols. Hideous devils and monsters stand outside the sacred circle, looking towards the centre, where a tabernacle stands open and a man kneels before it performing theurgistic rites. Left, an angel descends in a flood of light, presumably bringing from God the power to act on the physical world

Publication/Creation

London (65. Paternoster Row) : William Charlton Wright, [between 1800 and 1899]

Physical description

1 print : aquatint, with watercolour ; image 15.5 x 17 cm

Lettering

Magic ceremonies. Lettering under aquatint: "Such were the mystic rites, ceremonies and incantations, used by the ancient Theurgists to burst asunder the bonds of natural order, and to obtain an awful intercourse with the World of Spirits" Vide page 227. The tabernacle bears the inscriptions "Sic omnia" (thus are all things), Oratorium (place of prayer), "Felix cui [Hebrew tetragram] a consilius" [consiliis] (happy is he who is advised by God??), "IKHVNRW" (beginning of name of Heinrich Khunrath?), "Ne loqueris de deo absque lumine" (do not speak of God without light), "Hoc hoc agentibus nobis aderit ipsi [ipse] Deus" (To us when we do these things God himself shall be present); (above skull and hourglass) "Disce bene mori" (learn to die well)

Reference

Wellcome Collection 47025i

Type/Technique

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