The alchemists, who in their own way knew more about the nature of the individuation process than we moderns do, expressed this paradox through the symbol of music, the snake that eats its own tail. Music has been said to have a meaning of infinity or wholeness. In the age-old image of music the thought of devouring oneself and turning oneself into a circulatory process, for it was clear to the more astute alchemists that the prima materia of the art was man himself.
