Hermetic Magic

This article deals with Hermetic Magic as it is understood within the Thanedom of Technocratic Republics, and it is inspired on the Hermetic Magic of the roleplaying game Ars Magica. This is by no means an attempt to explain how the entirety of magic works within the world of Nation States, but how it does when regarding to the Hermetic Theory of Magic in the aforementioned nation.

Hermetic Theory of Magic

In the times before the Order of Hermes was founded by the creator of what today is known as the Hermetic Theory of Magic, the magus Bonisagus, the practice of magic was plagued by myriad of incompatible systems and methods, that made it impossible for two magi to share knowledge or train each other properly. Bonisagus' theory was built upon the need of an objective, measurable and universally explainable method of controlling the magical energies. When he was done developing it, he managed to answer all those needs by creating a flexible, although simple, set of guidelines for the manipulation of magic.

The birth of the Hermetic Theory of Magic opened the doors for an impressive development of the Art of Magic, as magi could now share knowledge and set basic guidelines for the research of new fields of power.

Hermetic Magic, however, is not perfect, and although highly useful and practical, it has its own share of problems and limitations, represented mainly by the so-called Supreme Limits of Magic, which are barriers that not even the most powerful hermetic magus can overcome. These are explained in further detail below.

The Hermetic Arts

The term “Arts” refers collectively to Techniques and Forms —two classes of magical disciplines that work together in spellcasting. Techniques govern the essential manipulations that magic can perform; Forms, the essential natural phenomena that magic can manipulate. Techniques and Forms have Latin names. A Technique is referred to by a verb conjugated in first person, and a Form by a noun. All forms of magical effects allowed under the Hermetic Theory can be described as the conjunction of both a Technique and a Form.

There are 5 Techniques -Creo, Intellego, Muto, Perdo, and Rego- and 10 Forms -Animal, Aquam, Auram, Corpus, Herbam, Ignem, Imaginem, Mentem, Terram, and Vim-.

Creo (I Create)

This Art allows the production of objects from nothing. It turns dreams into reality. When using a Creo spell, the magus enters a momentary state of transcendent meditation and contact the realm of Forms, in which all the objects that ever were and ever could be exist as perfect ideas. His magic finds the proper Form and impresses it on the real world, creating an expression of it. Objects created this way are closer to the world of Forms than are normal objects, so they are always perfect and flawless. A magus can also use the Art of Creo to perfect things that have deteriorated from their ideal nature,such as to heal a broken arm or to mend a broken vase. Pronounced ‘CRAY-oh.’

Intellego (I Perceive)

Intellego is the Art of perception. All things in the world are connected to each other, and Intellego allows magi the ability to see, read, and learn from these connections. Pronounced ‘in-TEL-lego.’

Muto (I Transform)

This is the Art of transformation and transmutation. Through this Art, magi can direct and control the essential mechanisms of change itself. A transformation is easiest when there is a strong connection between the original object and that resulting from the transformation: for example, it is relatively easy to turn a leaf into an apple. However, turning a leaf (living, flexible, and vegetable) into a sword (inert, unyielding, and mineral) is quite difficult. Pronounced ‘MOO-toe.’

Perdo (I Destroy)

The one trait held in common by all objects and creatures in the temporal world is that some day, inevitably, they will cease to exist. The magus who understands the Art of Perdo knows this, and uses magic to control the universal process whereby things are destroyed. Aging, disease, decay, and dissolution are all properties inherent to objects and living things and can be drawn out through this Art. Pronounced ‘PARE-doe.’

Rego (I Control)

The Art of Rego allows a magus to regulate matter or compel the actions of living things. One kind of Rego spell might lift someone into the air, and another might make a person act a certain way. Pronounced ‘RAY-go.’

Animal (Animal)

Animál concerns animals of all kinds, from the fish of the sea to the birds of the air. Animal spells cannot affect people, for they have souls whereas animals do not. Pronounced ‘ah-nee-MAHL.’

Aquam (Water)

Aquam concerns all manner of liquids. Through this Art, the magus gains access to the might of a roaring flood and the gentleness of a clear pool. Pronounced ‘AH-kwahm.’

Auram (Air)

Auram is the Art of air, wind, and weather. True flight is only possible through this Art. Pronounced ‘OW-rahm.’

Corpus (Body)

Corpus is the Art of humans and humanlike bodies. It governs the intricate interactions that occur in those bodies with souls, as well as those that once had souls. Pronounced ‘COR-poos.’

Herbam (Plant)

This Form concerns plants and trees. This includes plant matter of all types, including that which is no longer alive —like dead wood and linens. Pronounced ‘HARE-bahm.’

Ignem (Fire)

This Form concerns fire, heat, and light. Fire is the most lifelike of the four elements: it moves, it devours, and it grows. Also, just as a living thing, it can be killed by the other three elements —smothered by earth, quenched by water, or blown apart by wind. Fire’s position midway between inert matter and living being gives it the advantages of both. Pronounced ‘IG-nem.’

Imaginem (Image)

This Form concerns illusions and phantasms. It affects only the senses and can never affect matter. Masters of this Art have learned to separate the impressions a thing leaves on the senses from the thing itself, and many of them likewise become separated from what those around them see as reality. Pronounced ‘ih-MAH-gihnem.’

Mentem (Mind)

This Form concerns minds, thoughts, and spirits. It comes as close as magic can to affecting souls. Through this Art, magi manipulate what they call the body of the soul: memories, thoughts, and emotions. They can also affect the “bodies” of non-corporeal beings, such as ghosts, as these are maintained in the physical world directly by a spirit’s will. Pronounced ‘MEN-tem.’

Terram (Earth)

This Form concerns solids, especially earth and stone. Indeed, Terram affects the very foundation of the world. Although Terram magic is mighty, the earth proves resistant to manipulation. Just as stone is heavy and hard to lift, it is inert and hard to change, even through magic. Pronounced ‘TARE-rahm.’

Vim (Power)

This Form concerns raw magical power. All the Arts rely on the raw energy and potential of magic, but this Art refines the use of magic itself, allowing magi to assume even greater control of their spells. Vim also affects demons, which are innately magical creatures. Dealing with demons, however, is dangerous because of the risk of corruption and because it is against the code of the Hermetic Oath. Pronounced ‘WEEM.’

The Supreme Limits

Hermetic Magic, though a very powerful force, is not omnipotent. There are certain laws it must conform to and certain limits that it can never exceed. These limits are drawn from the medieval paradigm of post-Aristotelian, pre-Copernican physics and cosmology, from where the original Hermetic Theory of Magic was built upon.

The Supreme Limit of Divinity

Hermetic magic cannot overcome the power of the Highest Divinity or the deceptions of infernal powers. Thus it cannot affect the outcome of a miracle, manipulate the mind or body of someone buried in piety by the Church, alter True Faith, detect the presence of the deceptions or illusions of a demon, nor determine the purposes behind those deceptions or illusions.

The Supreme Limit of the Soul

Hermetic magic cannot affect an immortal soul, and so may not create true human life nor restore the dead to life.

The Supreme Limit of Essential Nature

Hermetic magic cannot alter or determine a fundamental principle of nature, such as aging, the interaction among the Four Elements, the needs of the human body or the way gravity works.

The Supreme Limit of Creation

Hermetic magic is incapable of creating anything permanently without the use of Vis, which includes permanent healing of someone's body or the production of a lasting object.

The Supreme Limit of Time

Hermetic magic is incapable of altering the passage of time. It cannot affect anything in the past, and can only affect the future by making changes in the present.

Vis

Raw magic power, known as Vis (pronounced ‘WEES’), is sometimes found stored in and partially constituting some physical substance. This can occur either because a magus has trapped it there or because it was deposited there by natural magical processes, although naturally occurring Vis can some times be found in such a pure state that it is absolutely separated from any kind of physical state. Vis trapped in some substance is called Material Vis, and magi have many uses for it.

Material Vis is always associated with a particular Technique or Form. Thus, there is Ignem vis, Creo vis, Imáginem vis —even Vim vis. Material Vis invariably exists in some kind of matter appropriate to the Technique or Form to which it corresponds. Animál vis might be found in blood, skins, or horns; Herbam vis in plant fiber or sap; Terram vis in crystals; and so on. When Material Vis is used its power is permanently lost. When this happens its substance usually changes —dissolving, withering, crumbling, shriveling, or otherwise degrading— in whatever way is appropriate to it.

Material Vis can be used in many applications. Examples include strengthening a spell, performing a ritual, creating a magical enchantment, making a spell permanent, or aiding in the study of the magical Art to which it corresponds. Because of its utility, vis is greatly prized by Magi. They often use it as a form of currency, measuring it is units called Pawns. Ten pawns are said to make a rook, while ten rooks make a queen. A queen of vis is a legendary quantity, and it would be highly unlikely for a given magus to possess even a sizable fraction of such an amount.

Magi often wear sources of vis in necklaces or rings so that other wizards or magical beings can readily perceive that they have vis to use in response to a threat.

But there is an even more powerful form of vis, called Raw Vis, the purest, most fundamental state of magical energy, which not something that can be often found in a natural state. Magi have developed a series of means to siphon it and bring it forward into the physical world, but artificially channeled vis tends to lack the strength and purity of naturally occurring one. But since the physical and magical world are not meant to exist together, one has to be quite lucky to ever find a source of vis that was not generated through the tampering of the fundamental laws of reality. Raw Vis can only be found when a natural process brings forth magical energies from the Realm of Magic into the temporal world, and such kind of things happen at an impressively small rate.