The premodern and early modern study of physical changes, particularly in Europe, Arabia, and China and chiefly in pursuit of an elixir of immortality, a universal panacea, and/or a philosopher's stone able to transmute base metals into gold, eventually developing into chemistry.
Any elaborate transformation process or algorithm.
The causing of any sort of mysterious sudden transmutation.
The apparent art of discovering secrets or the future by preternatural means.
The act of divining; a foreseeing or foretelling of future events.
An indication of what is to come in the future or what is secret; a prediction.