[HPforGrownups] Re: Nicolas Flamel

[Amanda Lewanski]

No: HPFGUIDX 22213

Amanda gazes wearily at the horse-shaped grease spot with "Flamel" on
it, before plunging in:

Neil Ward wrote:

> The Philosopher's Stone was not a tangible stone, but an imaginary
> object or substance encompassing knowledge of the method for
> transmuting base metals to gold (aka the Arcanum for gold) and of the
> Elixir of Life, among other things.

Exactly. "Among other things." Immortality was a side effect of
achieving the Stone, as was the ability to make gold. The Stone was a
metaphor for the developed man, the philosopher, one dedicated to
seeking truth within and without himself. In alchemy, it was the
process, not the goal, which was important. The irony at the heart of
alchemy was that by the time you reached the level of attainment which
would allow creation of the Stone, the knowledge and wisdom you had
garnered in the process would make its side effects of no value to you.
They would be trinkets, party tricks. It was this that was never
understood by the greedy of the world, for immortality or gold, and this
was why alchemists in it for the money never achieved the Stone.

> Would someone who had striven to discover the secret of
> immortality give it up just because Albus Dumbledore was wagging his
> finger?

He did not necessarily strive to discover the secret of immortality. He
was striving to achieve the Stone. The immortality was a side bennie. I
can see that after kicking around for 600+ years, he and Perrennelle
might see that the Stone represented too great a danger to allow it to
exist (especially as he is, in effect, the Stone himself, having reached
the stage where he has "transmuted" the base in his nature to gold,
which was the goal). Dumbledore might simply be telling the bare truth
here, and Flamel and Perrennelle will die. But I will grant you, he
never said *when.* <g>

--Amanda



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