The Secrets of Metals

Book excerpt: With the help of metals, humankind has established and ever-progressing position in the world and, in the process, has transformed human civilization and the face of the Earth itself. Furthermore, the harmony and effectiveness of many human bodily processes depend on the marvelous effects of metals. With each passing decade, researchers bring us knowledge of new facets of the cosmos of metals in and around us. Nonetheless, despite all the achievements of chemists and physicists, the world of metals holds many mysteries. In the surrounding world, we continually encounter new deposits of metals in the Earth, and these have enabled humankind to move toward ever greater levels of civilization and technological advances. And in the inner world of the human body, newly discovered layers of activities permeated by metals continually arise in our consciousness. Not only do we breathe with iron, but we also need copper to form blood and cobalt to avoid pernicious anemia. As research methods become increasingly refined and subtle, we continue to discover additional metals that are in fact regular components of our bodies. We find them not, however, as building blocks in the grosser, more physical sense, but as instruments by which our human entity accomplishes important physiological activities. In The Secrets of Metals, Wilhelm Pelikan --in the light of spiritual science --discusses the significance of the classic "seven metals" and their importance for humankind as well as for nature as a whole and the Earth. He also discusses the "newer" metals as well as the virtually unknown "radiation effects of metals --the effects of which Rudolf Steiner used therapeutically. Pelikan's method here is a phenomenological one, in which he helps us try to see natural objects in the Goethean sense, as developed by Rudolf Steiner. Here is a classic text for deeper understanding metals as a whole, as well as gaining a fuller appreciation of spiritual scientific research methods in relation to the world we inhabit. This volume is a translation of Sieben Metalle (Philosophisch-Anthropsophischer Verlag, Dornach, Switzerland).