Dew as the Neglected Cold of Every Day

Stop here, please. Honestly, why do neophytes always have to start with what makes them seem like initiates to those even more ignorant? If you lack the basics, please don’t spread yourself too thin.

I’ll answer you with a question: why is everything you’ve listed called dew?

The alchemists could then have called the thing drizzle or even rain, which better conveyed the idea of falling. Actually, they never put dew and drizzle in the same sentence. You did it. It’s not wrong as a consequence, but the starting points are wrong.

In fact, embodiment and dew are often synonymous in Alchemy. In your opinion, why is this?

You have just revealed a real alchemical thing: The Spiritus Mundi tends to hover in the air during the day, but at night, with the help of the moon, it falls on the Earth’s crust and in its most hidden recesses.

No, the nocturnal fall is only symbolic, in reality the correct term is “becoming body” or “entering the body”.

It’s not magic, but contact. Alchemists define the whole sequence as a “density scale”. And, I add, it’s a contact scale. All alchemical operations are based on this contact scale. Because, for the ancients, the void did not exist but a continuum, so dense that they imagined it could be cut with a knife. This scale is so complex that it is best not to go into details for now.

This is not the question you should be asking me right now. You still don’t understand the difference between common dew and philosophers’ dew. Actually, I’m using the wrong terms, because it’s not a matter of differences between the two, but of analogies and similarities. Alchemy is not an art of exceptions, but of analogies and commonalities; otherwise, all these different methods of alchemical work would not be possible. The humid path, the dry path, the metallurgical path, the path of wine, of earth, of manure, of urine, of vitriol, of sulfides, of marine salt and vinegar, of gold, of benzoin and myrrh, and, of course, also of dew.

Gathering or collecting? I say this, because there is a substantial difference between the two. But it’s not the time to talk about that now. Instead, let’s go back to the beginning. Why, after having spoken of the fusion of metals, did I invite you to understand dew?… Don’t answer, I’ll tell you right away: the whole thing lies in understanding what happens at the dew point.

Indeed. Dew forms during clear nights, when the Earth’s surface cools through radiation, causing the air temperature near the ground to drop to the dew point, where water vapor in the air condenses into tiny droplets on grass, leaves, and other surfaces. This phenomenon is most common in the early morning hours, before the sun warms the air again. The coldest part, with the longest time to cool down, is right before dawn. It’s coldest at dawn because it’s the time when the Earth has been losing heat throughout the night without receiving any (or very little) heat. The sun, though rising, strikes at a shallow angle, not yet sufficient to offset the heat radiated into space, creating a cold peak before solar heating becomes effective. The ground and the air in contact with it are constantly cooled by radiation throughout the night, and only with sunrise does a new influx of energy begin, which requires time to reheat. A “temperature inversion” is created, where the layer of air closest to the ground becomes the coldest, while the air above may be slightly warmer.

Yes. The blue hour is the hour of dew, but it is also the most fruitful hour for alchemical work. It is the moment when the Mercurius comes to light. If I tell you that the blue hour is also the hour when the final cooking of the philosopher’s egg should turn into the philosopher’s stone, you should understand what the other peculiar element of this hour before dawn is: the night.