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Reasoning and the natural world

Buer teaches moral philosophy, natural philosophy and logic, together with the virtues of herbs and plants. Healing ailments and providing good familiars accompany this instruction. His subjects concern conduct, reasoning and the natural world, while his healing office puts plant knowledge beside the treatment of illness. [1]

Related notices give this learning different emphases. Marbas teaches mechanical arts and causes or cures disease; Foras teaches logic and ethics alongside the virtues of herbs and stones; Stolas teaches astronomy with herbs and stones. Buer’s combination is distinguished by its philosophical subjects, plant knowledge and healing. [1][4][5][6]

The Sagittarius sentence

Buer’s appearance clause says that he appears in Sagittarius and has that shape when the Sun is there. It supplies a celestial sign and condition where other notices describe an animal or human body. The passage then leaves appearance behind and lists moral and natural philosophy, logic and the virtues of plants. [1]

The earlier English account

Scot’s Buer already teaches moral and natural philosophy, logic and the virtues of herbs, gives familiars and heals diseases, with fifty legions. His appearance receives only the phrase that he is seen in this sign. The 1904 Goetia gives a more specific association with Sagittarius and the Sun’s presence in that sign. [2][1]

Nicholson’s 1886 notes examine the obscure wording against Weyer’s Latin, where an asterisk follows the reference to a sign. On Nicholson’s reading, the mark stands for a missing word or passage in the earlier material. His conjecture addresses the obscure appearance clause, beside a clearly described and extensive teaching office. [2][1][3]

Sources and editions

The Book of the Goetia of Solomon the King — entry 10: Buer

S. L. MacGregor Mathers, translated; Aleister Crowley, edited, The Book of the Goetia of Solomon the King (1904), first-edition facsimile supplied by Keep Silence. Shemhamphorash, numbered catalogue entry 10, Buer; facsimile PDF page 12 (PDF index includes three preliminary plates)