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The Fairy-Faith in Celtic Countries, by W.Y. Evans-Wentz, [1911]

Alchemical and Mystical Theory

In the positive doctrines of mediaeval alchemists and mystics, e.g. Paracelsus and the Rosicrucians, as well as their modern followers, the ancient metaphysical ideas of Egypt, Greece, and Rome find a new expression; and these doctrines raise the final problem--if there are any scientific grounds for believing in such pygmy nature-spirits as these remarkable thinkers of the Middle Ages claim to have studied as beings actually existing in nature.

These mediaeval metaphysicians, inheritors of pre-Platonic, Platonic, and neo-Platonic teachings, purposely obscured their doctrines under a covering of alchemical terms, so as to safeguard themselves against persecution, open discussion of occultism not being safe during the Middle Ages, as it was among the ancients and happily is now again in our own generation.

But they were quite scientific in their methods, for they divided all invisible beings into four distinct classes:

• the Angels, who in character and function are parallel to the gods of the ancients, and equal to the Tuatha De Danann of the Irish, are the highest; below them are the
• Devils or Demons, who correspond to the fallen angels of Christianity; the third class includes all
• Elementals, sub-human Nature-Spirits, who are generally regarded as having pygmy stature; and the fourth division comprises the
• Souls of the Dead, and the shades or ghosts of the dead.