Author(s): Gary P. Caton

Education

Messenger, trickster, psychopomp, Mercury's myriad forms belie a genuinely complex character. And yet to most modern astrologers he remains a relatively one-dimensional figure. Caton's Hermetic triptych is designed to ground you in the actual observation of Mercury as a living planetary phenomenon, and to bring the lessons of this planetary divinity back to the world of applied astrology. Hermetica Triptycha is the first-ever comprehensive and integral treatment of Mercury's retrogrades, with a one hundred and twenty-five year ephemeris to track the sequential pattern of the planet Mercury's backward trickster medicine dance as it cycles through: three repeated degrees over forty days, three signs of one elemental triplicity each year, the four elements every six to seven years, twelve elemental returns over seventy-nine years. With additional analysis, lessons, and exercises including: the magical power of the image derived from Mercury's cycle as a visible "star", the philosophical, psycho-spiritual and practical ramifications of our views and attitudes toward Mercury retrograde, and individual chapters for using each of the four cycles of Mercury's retrogrades to facilitate personal growth, psycho-spiritual transformation, and real-world magic.