Book is a custom leather bound facsimile edition with marbled end papers, 597pp. Book is in fine unread condition. [This edition is a facsimile reprint of the 1918 reissue.]

About this book:

Mary Anne Atwood was a hermetist and a believer in spiritual alchemy. She believed that all parts of our universe were one, watched over by a deity, and that the alteration of the fundamental state of an object’s being was possible by spiritual enlightenment. After a childhood heavily influenced by her father, a researcher into spiritualism, Mary was always interested in the possibility of an alternative spirituality and a realm beyond the tangible. This work is her attempt to transmit her beliefs to the world.

Mary published A Suggestive Inquiry into the Hermetic Mystery in 1850, originally with her father’s support and permission, her second work in the field. Mr. South financed the anonymous publication of the book but sadly without ever reading a full draft of her manuscript. Once he read the book upon publication he was immediately seized with powerful anxiety and attempted to buy back every copy, with the aim of burning every one to protect the secrets inside. Nearly every copy was lost due to his efforts.

Thomas South is said to have believed so fervently that this text was dangerous that he ceased work on his own poetry in response to it, wary of disturbing the spiritual unknowns in all our minds. Despite the few copies that survived Mr South’s purge, this text is now available to us to read. No doubt the reader would be advised to tread lightly in the practice of spiritual alchemy as ‘finding the Sophia in the mind’ would even in the author’s opinion be a difficult task.