Rosicrucians' George Knox Dies, Sought Philosopher's Stone

December 1898

The Rosicrucians

Londoner Who Spent His Life Seeking the Philosopher's Stone and the Elixir of Life

The pre-Faraday school of chemistry, the chemistry of the elixir of life and the philosopher's stone, in whose strange nomenclature metals were known by such uncouth names us the "Red Lion," the "Green Serpent," the "Blue Dragon," and invested with mysterious, inexplicable properties, has recently lost one of its last, if not its very last genuine disciple.

His name was George Knox, and he died the other day in London at the age of somewhere about 90 years. For the last 30 years he had lived in the quarter of the city known as St. John's Wood, the last place where one would expect to find a philosopher. The old gentleman, however, knew nothing of the ways of his neighbors and they knew as little of his. Though a cheerful old man and exceedingly active for his years, he lived the life of a hermit, his whole energies being bent on the task of resolving the chemical problems of the middle ages. Mr. Knox used to call himself the "last of the Rosicrucians," and the chief objects of his pursuit were the elixir of life and the philosopher's stone. Three small fortunes he had had left to him at different periods of his life and the whole of two of them and the greater part of the third went into the crucible and the mortar. When a young man he had traveled all over the east, camping with Bedouins and hobnobbing with Brahmins and Tartars, seeking information concerning the recondite and occult.

The latter half of his life was spent in endeavoring to apply the information thus gained. One fortune went in the making of a few small rubies and a commercially valueless diamond. The elixir of life swallowed up the second. Among other processes this latter chimera involved the boiling of a liquid in a crucible for three yours. Up till the day of his death he believed that he had discovered if not the veritable elixir at least something approximating to it, and to the close he attributed his health and longevity to his concoction. The results of some of the experiments he made with the elixir before he perfected it were curious. It killed his favorite cat and took all the lubrication out of his own joints, so that for several days he went about creaking like a gate with rusty hinges. — N. Y. Sun.