Mesmerists and Alchemists in Victorian London

Abstract This chapter explores the context in which Mary Anne South composed her Suggestive Inquiry into the Hermetic Mystery and shows that it remained faithful to Jacob Boehme’s spiritual alchemy despite its modern trappings. In the years around 1850, her father, Thomas South, corresponded with Christopher Walton, who would amass the largest collection of manuscript works by Dionysius Andreas Freher. Extant letters demonstrate that they discussed Freher and alchemy side by side. Father and daughter initially composed a work titled Early Magnetism together but subsequently discovered in alchemy and spiritual rebirth matters they considered of greater importance. This insight found expression in Mary Anne South’s Suggestive Inquiry, published anonymously and quickly withdrawn. Despite its obscurity, it gives voice to Boehme’s spiritual alchemy in modernised jargon.