This classic handbook elucidates the nearly forgotten but highly valuable alchemical methods for preparing natural remedies. While ordinary tinctures and infusions use only a part of the great curative potential of plants, the methods of plant alchemy "open" the medicinal plants completely, revealing their more powerful healing properties. Drawing on the rich imagery and symbolism of ancient source materials, the author describes these methods in great detail, showing the reader how to prepare plant remedies alchemically as well as imparting a knowledge of the ideological world in which alchemistic and hermetic thought flowered. Topics covered include the extraction of the three Philosophical Principles (Mercury, Sulfur, and Salt) from medicinal plants, the influence of the stars, the Plant Magistery of Paracelsus, the Circulatum Minus of Urbigerus, the Elixir recipe of Labavius, the Clyssus process of Therneysser, the Vegetable Stone of Isaac Hollandus, and alchemistic signs and symbols. With its emphasis on balance and wholeness, genuine alchemy belongs to the best of the healing traditions, providing us with one of the noblest paths to a holistic medicine