Exaltatio
Exaltation
Raising the matter to its highest degree.
Exaltatio: what does it mean in analytical psychology?
The tenth of Ripley’s Twelve Gates, after sublimation and fermentation: the purified matter is lifted up and brought to its full virtue, ready to multiply and to be projected upon base metals.
Read psychologically, it is the moment when what has been worked on is lifted into its full value, with the danger that lifting always carries, of rising too high and losing touch with the ground.
Exaltatio: where does it appear in myth and tradition?
The eagle of the alchemists; the exalted planet in its sign; the lifting up of the brazen serpent.
From the Sources
Philalethes writes that the Arcanum sought is nothing but gold exalted to its highest degree of perfection, through the operation of Nature.
“The Arcanum which we seek is nothing but gold exalted to its highest degree of perfection, through the operation of Nature”
Michael Sendivogius (author of the tract read), The Hermetic Museum, Restored and Enlarged, Philalethes, "The Metamorphosis of Metals" (first of "The Three Treatises of Philalethes"), p. 243. Now first done into English from the Latin original published at Frankfort in the year 1678; in two volumes, Volume II; London: James Elliott and Co., 1893 (Internet Archive OCR text). The text, read in part
Paracelsus places exaltation, with elevation and fixation, under sublimation, the second of his seven degrees of transmutation.
“Sublimation is the second degree, and one of the most principall for the Transmutation of many Naturall things: under which is contained Exaltation, Elevation, and Fixation; and it is not much unlike Distillation.”
Micheel Sandivogius; Paracelsus (Nine Books Of the Nature of Things), A New Light of Alchymie ... Also Nine Books Of the Nature of Things, Written by Paracelsus ... Also a Chymicall Dictionary, Paracelsus, Of the Nature of Things, Book VII. Faithfully translated out of the Latin into the English tongue, by J. F. M.D.; London, Printed by Richard Cotes, for Thomas Williams, at the Bible in Little-Britain, 1650. The text, read in part
Each passage is quoted from the text named, which the press fetched and read, and was checked word for word against a fresh copy of it; the link opens that copy. Passages are given as printed, without the editors’ footnote numbers, and with words broken across lines joined.
Where to Read
- George Ripley, The Compound of Alchymy (1471)
Jung’s writings are cited by the volume of the Collected Works (CW), Bollingen Series / Princeton, 1953–79.
Related Symbols
In the Glossary: Sublimation.
Also among Operations of the Work
“Learn as much as you can about symbolism; then forget it all when you are analysing a dream.”
Cite This Entry
“Exaltatio.” In Symbols of the Psyche, the Symbolarium. The Thinking Press, 2026. https://thethinkingpress.org/symbolarium/psyche/exaltatio.
Nearby in the alphabet: The Eternal Return: All things return, endlessly: the heaviest thought. The Eternal Youth: The youth who will not be bound by time. The Eye: Sight, awareness, and the eye that watches. The Fall: The loss of paradise, and the birth of consciousness.