According the helpfile "help magic," accessible after gaining access to scroll magic through the scribes:
We have this, on the one hand, and on the other, a sort of scientific paradigm on the part of the players that extends to characters. Alchemy is an "early chemistry," a mixing of elements to create compounds. It is cookery. But we have a magical, medieval mindset is present in other areas: Gods are a certainty, their works are evident, spirits move in everything. Songs are rituals that can alter reality. Words on scroll, recited, are infused with meaning. They are more than words; they resonate, have a power of their own beyond immediate perception, and move the world.The miracles of the clerics, the magical songs of the skalds and the potions of the alchmenist does count as real magic for the mages. Some called then and the other form of magic as the 'low path og magic' or how Ascalon mention:more legerdemain and illusion as real magic. But it known the the deities can become very angry then their clerics use magic of the high path!
Would it follow, then, that alchemy is more than cookery, but is more like what it was to our intellectual ancestors, who monitored the stars to time their distillations in accordance with the zodiac, saw metals as associated with certain angels, wore sigils engraved in lead, and even tried to create human life inside eggshells?