Corpus Hermeticum — Poimandres, the Vision of Hermes

Methought a Being more than vast, in size beyond all bounds, called out my name and saith : What wouldst thou hear and see, and what hast thou in mind to learn and know ?

He saith : I am Man-Shepherd, Mind of all-masterhood ; I know what thou desirest and I'm with thee everywhere.

He answered back to me : Hold in thy mind all thou wouldst know, and I will teach thee.

But in a little while Darkness came settling down on part [of it], awesome and gloomy, coiling in sinuous folds, so that methought it like unto a snake.

And then the Darkness changed into some sort of a Moist Nature, tossed about beyond all power of words, belching out smoke as from a

fire, and groaning forth a wailing sound that beggars all description.

[And] after that an outcry inarticulate came forth from it, as though it were a Voice of Fire.

The Air, too, being light, followed after the Fire ; from out the Earthand-Water rising up to Fire so that it seemed to hang therefrom.

But Earthand-Water stayed so mingled each with other, that Earth from Water no one could discern. Yet were they moved to hear by reason of the Spirit-Word (Logos) pervading them.

Nay ; that shall I know, I said.

That Light, He said, am I, thy God, Mind, prior to Moist Nature which appeared from Darkness ; the Light-Word (Logos) [that appeared] from Mind is Son of God.

What then ?— say I.

Know that what sees in thee and hears is the Lord's Word (Logos) ; but Mind is Father-God. Not separate are they the one from other ; just in their union [rather] is it Life consists.

Thanks be to Thee, I said.

So, understand the Light [He answered], and make friends with it.

But when He raised His head, I see in Mind the Light, [but] now in Powers no man could number, and Cosmos grown beyond all bounds, and that the Fire was compassed round about by a most mighty Power, and [now] subdued had come unto a stand.

And when I saw these things I understood by reason of Man-Shepherd's Word (Logos).

And I say: Whence then have Nature's elements their being?

To this He answer gives : From Will of God.

or " world " ; and in the original there is frequently a play upon

the two meanings, as in the case of logos.

[Nature *] received the Word (Logos), and gazing on the Cosmos Beautiful did copy it, making herself into a cosmos, by means of her own elements and by the births of souls.

of these [spheres] begins where it doth end, as Mind doth will.

And from the downward elements Nature brought forth lives reasonless ; for He did not extend the Keason (Logos) [to them]. The Air brought forth things winged; the Water things that swim, and Earthand-Water one from another parted, as Mind willed. And from her bosom Earth produced what lives she had, fourfooted things and reptiles, beasts wild and tame.

Changing his state to the formative sphere, in that he was to have his whole authority, he

gazed upon his Brother's creatures. They fell in love with him, and gave him each a share of his own ordering.

And after that he had welllearned their essence and had become a sharer in their nature, he had a mind to break right through the Boundary of their spheres, and to subdue the might of that which pressed upon the Fire.

And when she saw that Form of beauty which can never satiate, and him who [now] possessed within himself each single energy of [all seven] Rulers as well as God's [own] Form, she smiled with love ; for 'twas as though she'd seen the image of Man's fairest form upon her Water, his shadow on her Earth.

He in his turn beholding the form like to himself, existing in her, in her Water, loved it and willed to live in it ; and with the will came act, and [so] he vivified the form devoid of reason.

And Nature took the object of her love and wound herself completely round him, and they were intermingled, for they were lovers.

Though deathless and possessed of sway o'er all, yet doth he suffer as a mortal doth, subject to Fate.

Thus though above the Harmony, within the Harmony he hath become a slave. Though malefemale, as from a Father malefemale, and though he's sleepless from a sleepless [Sire], yet is he overcome [by sleep].

The Shepherd said : This is the mystery kept hid until this day.

, energy, and realization.

Nature embraced by Man brought forth a wonder, oh so wonderful. For as he had the nature of the Concord of the Seven, who, as I said to thee, [were made] of Fire and Spirit — Nature delayed not, but immediately brought forth seven " men," in correspondence with the natures of the Seven, malefemale and moving in the air.

Thereon [I said]: 0 Shepherd, . . . ; for now I'm filled with great desire and long to hear ; do not run off.

The Shepherd said : Keep silence, for not as yet have I unrolled for thee the first discourse (logos).

Lo ! I am still, I said.

And Man from Life and Light changed into soul and mind, — from Life to soul, from Light to mind.

And thus continued all the senseworld's

parts until the period of their end and new beginnings.

The period being ended, the bond that bound them all was loosened by God's Will. For all the animals being malefemale, at the same time with man were loosed apart ; some became partly male, some in like fashion [partly] female. And straightway God spake by His Holy Word (Logos) :

" Increase ye in increasing, and multiply in multitude, ye creatures and creations all ; and man that hath Mind in him, let him learn to know that he himself is deathless, and that the cause of death is love, though Love is all." 3

And he who thus hath learned to know himself, hath reached that Good which doth transcend abundance; but he who through a love that leads astray, expends his love upon his body, —

, that is Nature as Sophia or Providence or Will.

he stays in Darkness wandering, and suffering through his senses things of Death.

Thou seem'st, he said, O thou, not to have given heed to what thou heardest. Did not I bid thee think?

Yea do I think, and I remember, and therefore give Thee thanks.

If thou didst think [thereon], [said He], tell me : Why do they merit death who are in Death ?

It is because the gloomy Darkness is the root and base of the material frame ; from it came the Moist Nature ; from this the body in the senseworld was composed ; and from this [body] Death doth the Water drain.

And I reply : the Father of the universals doth consist of Light and Life, and from Him Man was born.

Thou sayest well, [thus] speaking. Light and Life is Father-God, and from Him Man was born.

If then thou learnest that thou art thyself of

Life and Light, and that them [only] happen st to be out of them, thou shalt return again to Life. Thus did Man-Shepherd speak.

But tell me further, Mind of me, I cried, how shall / come to Life again .... for God doth say : " The man who hath Mind in him, let him learn to know that he himself [is deathless]."

Thou sayest well, O thou, thus speaking. I, Mind, myself am present with holy men and good, the pure and merciful, men who live piously.

[To such] my presence doth become an aid, and straightway they gain gnosis of all things, and win the Father's love by their pure lives, and give Him thanks, invoking on Him blessings, and chanting hymns, intent on Him with ardent love.

And ere they give the body up unto its proper death, they turn them with disgust from its sensations, from knowledge of what things they operate. Nay, it is I, the Mind, that will not let the operations which befall the body, work to their [natural] end. For being doorkeeper I'll close up [all] the entrances, and cut the mental actions off which base and evil energies induce.

yielding my place to the Avenging Daimon, who sharpening the fire, tormenteth him and addeth fire to fire upon him, and rusheth on him through his senses, thus rendering him the readier for transgressions of the law, so that he meets with greater torment ; nor doth he ever cease to have desire for appetites inordinate, insatiately striving in the dark.

To this Man-Shepherd said : When thy material body is to be dissolved, first thou surrenderest the body by itself unto the work of change, and thus the form thou hadst doth vanish, and thou surrenderest thy way of life, void of its energy, unto the Daimon. The body's senses next pass back into their sources, becoming separate, and resurrect as energies ; and passion and desire withdraw unto that nature which is void of reason.

To the first zone he gives the Energy of Growth and Waning ; unto the second [zone], Device of Evils [now] deenergized ; unto the third, the Guile of the Desires deenergized; unto the fourth, his Domineering Arrogance, [also] deenergized ; unto the fifth, unholy Daring and the Kashness of Audacity, deenergized ; unto the sixth, Striving for Wealth by evil means, deprived of its aggrandisement ; and to the seventh zone, Ensnaring Falsehood, deenergized.

They who are there welcome his coming there with joy; and he, made like to them that sojourn there, doth further hear the Powers who are above the Nature that belongs unto the Eighth, singing their songs of praise to God in language of their own.

And then they, in a band, go to the Father home ; of their own selves they make surrender of themselves to Powers, and [thus] becoming Powers they are in God. This the good end for

those who have gained Gnosis — to be made one with God.

Why shouldst thou then delay? Must it not be, since thou hast all received, that thou shouldst to the worthy point the way, in order that through thee the race of mortal kind may by [thy] God be saved ?

But I, with thanks and blessings unto the Father of the universal [Powers], was freed, full of the power He had poured into me, and full of what He'd taught me of the nature of the All and of the loftiest Vision.

And I began to preach to men the Beauty of Devotion and of Gnosis :

Ye earthborn folk, why have ye given up yourselves to Death, while yet ye have the power of sharing Deathlessness ? Repent, O ye, who walk with Error arm in arm and make of Ignorance the sharer of your board ; get ye from out the light of Darkness, and take your part in Deathlessness, forsake Destruction !

But I made them arise, and I became a leader of the Race towards home, teaching the words (logoi), how and in what way they shall be saved. I sowed in them the words (logoi) of wisdom ; of Deathless Water were they given to drink.

And when even was come and all sun's beams began to set, I bade them all give thanks to God. And when they had brought to an end the giving of their thanks, each man returned to his own resting place.

the soul's awakening, and closing of the eyes — true vision, pregnant with Good my silence, and the utterance of my word (logos) begetting of good things.

All this befell me from my Mind, that is Man-Shepherd, Word (Logos) of all masterhood, by whom being God-inspired I came unto the Plain of Truth. Wherefore with all my soul and strength thanksgiving give I unto Father-God.

Holy art Thou, O God, whose Will perfects itself by means of its own Powers.

Holy art Thou, O God, who willeth to be known and art known by Thine own.

Holy art Thou, who didst by Word (Logos) make to consist the things that are.

Holy art Thou, of whom Allnature hath been made an Image.

Holy art Thou, whose Form Nature hath never made.

Holy art Thou, more powerful than all power.

Holy art Thou, transcending all preeminence.

Holy Thou art, Thou better than all praise.

Accept my reason's offerings pure, from soul and heart for aye stretched up to Thee, O Thou unutterable, unspeakable, Whose Name naught but the Silence can express.

For this cause I believe, and I bear witness ; I go to Life and Light. Blessed art Thou, O Father. Thy Man would holy be as Thou art holy, e'en as Thou gavesfc him Thy full authority 4 [to be].

Asclepius. Assuredly.

Her. And must not that in which it's moved be greater than the moved ?

Asc. It must.

Her. Mover, again, has greater power than moved ?

Asc. It has, of course.

Her. The nature, furthermore, of that in which it's moved must be quite other from the nature of the moved ?

Asc. It must completely.

Asc. Assuredly.

Her. And massive too, for it is crammed with multitudes of other mighty frames, nay rather all the other bodies that there are ?

Asc. It is.

Her. And yet the cosmos is a body ?

Asc. It is a body.

Her. And one that's moved ?

Her. Of what size, then, must be the space in which it's moved ; and of what kind [must be] the nature [of that space]? Must it not be far vaster [than the cosmos], in order that it may be able to find room for its continued course, so that the moved may not be cramped for want of room and lose its motion ?

Asc. Something, Thricegreatest one, it needs must be, immensely vast.

Asc. Agreed.

Her. Space, then, is bodiless. But bodiless must either be some godlike thing or God [Himself]. And by "some godlike thing" I mean no more the generable but the ingenerable.

God is first " thinkable " for us, not for Himself, for that the thing that's thought doth fall beneath the thinker's sense. God then can not be " thinkable" unto Himself, in that He's thought of by Himself as being nothing else than what He thinks. But He is " something else " for us, and so He's thought of by us.

Further, all that is moved is moved not in the moved but in the stable. And that which moves [another] is of course stationary, for 'tis impossible that it should move with it.

Asc. How is it, then, that things down here, Thricegreatest one, are moved with those that are [already] moved ? For thou hast said the errant spheres were moved by the inerrant one.

Her. This is not, O Asclepius, a moving with, but one against; they are not moved with

one another, but one against the other. It is this contrariety which turneth the resistance of their motion into rest. For that resistance is the rest of motion.

The Bears up there, which neither set nor rise, think'st thou they rest or move ?

Asc. They move, Thricegreatest one.

Her. And what their motion, my Asclepius ?

Asc. Motion that turns for ever round the same.

Her. But revolution — motion round same — is fixed by rest. For " roundthe-same " doth stop "beyondsame." "Beyondsame" then, being stopped, if it be steadied in "roundsame" — the contrary stands firm, being rendered ever stable by its contrariety.

Asc. Thou hast, Thricegreatest one, adduced a most clear instance.

Her. All motion, then, is caused in station and by station.

The motion, therefore, of the cosmos (and of every other hylic animal) will not be caused by things exterior to the cosmos, but by things interior [outward] to the exterior — such [things] as soul, or spirit, or some such other thing incorporal.

Tis not its body that doth move the living thing in it ; nay, not even the whole [body of the universe a lesser] body e'en though there be no life in it.

Her. By no means, O Asclepius. The something-inthe-body, the thatwhich-moves the thing inanimate, this surely 's not a body, for that it moves the two of them — both body of the lifter and the lifted ? So that a thing that's lifeless will not move a lifeless thing. That which doth move [another thing] is animate, in that it is the mover.

Thou seest, then, how heavy laden is the soul,

for it alone doth lift two bodies. That things, moreover, moved are moved in something as well as moved by something is clear.

Her. Thou sayest well, 0 [my] Asclepius ! For naught of things that are is void. Alone the ' ' isnot " 's void [and] stranger to subsistence. For that which is subsistent can never change to void.

Asc. Are there, then, O Thricegreatest one, no such things as an empty cask, for instance, and an empty jar, a cup and vat, and other things like unto them?

Her. Alack, Asclepius, for thy farwandering from the truth ! Think'st thou that things most full and most replete are void ?

Her. Is not air body ?

Asc. It is.

ranslation.

Her. And doth this body not pervade all things, and so, pervading, fill them? And " body " ; doth body not consist from blending of the " four " ? Full, then, of air are all thou callest void ; and if of air, then of the " four/' l

Further, of this the converse follows, that all thou callest full are void — of air ; for that they have their space filled out with other bodies, and, therefore, are not able to receive the air therein. These, then, which thou dost say are void, they should be hollow named, not void ; for they not only are, but they are full of air and spirit.

Her. The Bodiless, Asclepius.

Asc. What, then, is Bodiless ?

Her. 'Tis Mind and Reason (Logos), whole out of whole, all selfembracing, free from all body, from all error free, unsensible to body and untouchable, self stayed in self, containing all, preserving those that are, whose rays, to use a

likeness, are Good, Truth, Light beyond light, the Archetype of soul.

Asc. What, then, is God ?

Her. God, therefore, is not Mind, but Cause

that the Mind is ; God is not Spirit, but Cause that Spirit is ; God is not Light, but Cause that the Light is. Hence should one honour God with these two names [the Good and Father] — names which pertain to Him alone and no one else.

For no one of the other socalled gods, no one of men, or daimones, can be in any measure Good, but God alone ; and He is Good alone and nothing else. The rest of things are separable all from the Good's nature ; for [all the rest] are soul and body, which have no space that can contain the Good.

The rest of the immortal ones are natheless honoured with the name of God, and spoken of as gods ; but God is Good not out of courtesy but out of nature. For that God's nature and the Good is one ; one is the kind of both, from which all other kinds [proceed].

The Good is He who gives all things and naught receives. God, then, doth give all things and receive naught. God, then, is Good, and Good is God.

because He is the thatwhich-maketh all. The part of father is to make.

Wherefore childmaking is a very great and a most pious thing in life for them who think aright, and to leave life on earth without a child a very great misfortune and impiety ; and he who hath no child is punished by the daimons after death.

And this the punishment : that that man's soul who hath no child, shall be condemned unto a body with neither man's nor woman's nature, a thing accurst beneath the sun.

Wherefore, Asclepius, let not your sympathies be with the man who hath no child, but rather pity his mishap, knowing what punishment abides for him.

Let all that has been said, then, be to thee, Asclepius, an introduction to the gnosis of the nature of all things.

THE SACRED SERMON

OF HERMES

(Text: P. 31-33; Pat. 8b-9.)

Darkness that knew no bounds was in Abyss, and Water [too] and subtle Breath intelligent ; these were by Power of God in Chaos.

Then Holy Light arose ; and there collected 'neath Dry Space from out Moist Essence

Elements ; and all the Gods do separate things out from fecund Nature.

And 2 Heaven was seen in seven circles ; its Gods were visible in forms of stars with all their signs; while Nature had her members made articulate together with the Gods in her. And [Heaven's] periphery revolved in cyclic course, borne on by Breath of God.

And they selected out the births of men for gnosis of the works of God and attestation of the energy of Nature; the multitude of men for

presumably the "Water" of space. The heavy things are apparently primaeval or cosmic " Earth."

lordship over all beneath the Heaven and gnosis of its blessings, that they might increase in increasing and multiply in multitude, and every soul infleshed by revolution of the Cyclic Gods, for observation of the marvels of the Heaven and Heaven's Gods' revolution, and of the works of God and energy of Nature, for tokens of its blessings, for gnosis of the power of God, that they might know the fates that follow good and evil [deeds] and learn the cunning work of all good arts.

And there shall be memorials mighty of their handiworks upon the earth, leaving dim trace behind when cycles are renewed.

For every birth of flesh ensouled, and of the fruit of seed, and every handiwork, though it decay, shall of necessity renew itself, both by the renovation of the Gods and by the turninground of Nature's rhythmic wheel.

For that whereas the Godhead is Nature's evermaking-newagain the cosmic mixture, Nature herself is also coestablished in that Godhead.

THE CUP OR MONAD

OF HERMES TO TAT

(Text : P. 34-4 ; Pat. 26b-27.)

This Body of Him is a thing no man can touch, or see, or measure, a Body inextensible, like to no other frame. 'Tis neither Fire nor Water, Air nor Breath; yet all of them come from it. Now being Good He willed to consecrate this [Body] to Himself alone, and set its Earth in order and adorn it.

Tat. Why then did God, O father, not on all bestow a share of Mind ?

Her. He willed, my son, to have it set up in the midst for souls, just as it were a prize.

sent it down, joining a Herald [to it], to whom He gave command to make this proclamation to the hearts of men :

to retain it in English by using both meanings. The three preceding sentences, from "This Body" onwards, are quoted by Stobaeus, Phys., I. ii. ; G. i. ; W. 38, 1 ff., under the heading " Of Hermes."

Baptize thyself with this Cup's baptism, what heart can do so, thou that hast faith thou ' canst ascend to Him that hath sent down the Cup, thou that dost know for what thou didst come into being !

As many then as understood the Herald's tidings and doused themselves in Mind, became partakers in the Gnosis ; and when they had "received the Mind" they were made "perfect

men."

But they who do not understand the tidings, these, since they possess the aid of Reason [only] and not Mind, are ignorant wherefor they have come into being and whereby.

But they who have received some portion of God's gift, these, Tat, if we judge by their deeds, have from Death's bonds won their release ; for they embrace in their own Mind all things,

things on the earth, things in the heaven, and things above the heaven, — if there be aught. And having raised themselves so far they sight the Good ; and having sighted It, they look upon their sojourn here as a mischance ; and in disdain of all, both things in body and the bodiless, they speed their way unto that One and Only One.

Tat. Father, I, too, would be baptized.

Her. Unless thou first shalt hate thy Body, son, thou canst not love thy Self. But if thou lov'st thy Self thou shalt have Mind, and having Mind thou shalt share in the Gnosis.

Tat. Father, what dost thou mean ?

Her. It is not possible, my son, to give thyself to both, — I mean to things that perish and to things divine. For seeing that existing things are twain, Body and Bodiless, in which the perishing and the divine are understood, the man who hath the will to choose is left the choice of one or other ; for it can never be the twain should meet. And in those souls to whom the choice is left, the waning of the one causes the other's growth to show itself.

Thou see'st, son, how many are the bodies through which we have to pass, how many are the choirs of daimones, how vast the system of the starcourses 2 [through which our Path doth lie], to hasten to the One and Only God.

For to the Good there is no other shore ; It hath no bounds ; It is without an end > and

oj', — lit. not to be crossed, not to be forded.

for Itself It is without beginning, too, though unto us it seemeth to have one — the Gnosis.

Let us lay hold, therefore, of the beginning, and quickly speed through all [we have to pass].

Tis very hard, to leave the things we have grown used to, which meet our gaze on every side, and turn ourselves back to the Old Old [Path].

Appearances delight us, whereas things which appear not make their believing hard.

Now evils are the more apparent things, whereas the Good can never show Itself unto the eyes, for It hath neither form nor figure.

Therefore the Good is like Itself alone, and unlike all things else ; for 'tis impossible that That which hath no body should make Itself apparent to a body.

The Oneness being Source and Eoot of all, is in all things as Koot and Source. Without [this] Source is naught; whereas the Source [Itself] is from naught but Itself, since It is

Source of all the rest. It is Itself Its Source, since It may have no other Source.

The Oneness then being Source, containeth every number, but is contained by none ; engendereth every number, but is engendered by no other one.

And now, O Tat, God's Image hath been sketched for thee, as far as it can be ; and if thou wilt attentively dwell on it and observe it with thy heart's eyes, believe me, son, thou'lt find the Path that leads above ; nay, that Image shall become thy Guide itself, because the Sight [Divine] hath this peculiar [charm], it holdeth fast and draweth unto it those who succeed in opening their eyes, just as, they say, the magnet [draweth] iron.

COMMENT AEY

THE TITLE

This beautiful little treatise, in which the great principles of the Gnosis are set forth so clearly and lucidly by the philosophermystic who penned it so many centuries ago, bears a double, or rather a triple, title: "Of Hermes to Tat: The Cup or Monad [or Oneness]." l The double title, however, is but a choice of names, for The Cup is The Oneness, — The One Element, the " Body " of God, which is the Cause of all bodies and yet itself is bodiless ; in other words, the Monad is the Intelligible Cosmos itself, God's Image, elsewhere called His Alonebegotten Son.

That this idea of a Cup or Mixingbowl (Crater), in the symbolic sense of an allcontaining receptacle, in which all the elements were blended together, and in the metaphysical sense of a transcendent Unity, the source of all things measurable and numberable, was one of the main doctrines of the Trismegistic tradition, is plain from the Pcemandrist Zosimus, who refers especially to this Cup as the symbol of Spiritual Baptism — that is, the plunging of the whole nature into the Great Ocean of Spirit or Mind, so that the man becomes irradiate with Life and illumined with Light.

For a consideration of this Crater or Cup symbolism I must refer the reader to the chapter so entitled in the "Prolegomena"; it there being shown that in all probability it was transmitted along the Orphic line

of tradition, though doubtless the Egyptian had some similar ideas.

Our treatise should be read in the closest connection with C. H., xi. (xii.), "The Mind to Hermes," which is its " esoteric " counterpart. What is here set forth for Tat by Hermes is there imparted to Hermes by the Mind; what is here set forth for the probationer or " hearer " is there set forth for the advanced disciple or " seer " ; or, to use Mystery terms, what is here told to the Mystes is there revealed to the Epopt. Thus, then, the Tatinstruction begins.

THE BAPTISM OF THE MIND

The ChristBaptism is the plunging of the whole nature into the Mindfilled Cup, — the Pleroma of the Divine Being whose Body and Mind are one, — for is

not the Cup the Body of God, " consecrated unto Himself alone" (§ 1), the Universal Body of all things ?

THE HOLY GRAIL

It would be fascinating to speculate on what connection this Cup of Initiation may have had with the Mystic Eucharist, and the Original of the later Grailtradition, which a great master of music and song has in our days made to live again in undying melody, and so restored it to its more universal significance. How Wagner sensed the marvel of the wondrous Vision with a poet's intuition may be seen from his own words :

" To the enraptured gaze of one longing for celestial love, the clear blue atmosphere of heaven seems at first to condense itself into a wonderful, scarcely perceptible, but dazzlingly beautiful Vision. Then with gradually increasing precision the wonderworking angelic host is delineated in infinitely delicate outlines, as, conveying the holy vessel in its midst, it insensibly descends from the blazing heights of heaven. As the vision grows more and more distinct, . . . the heart throbs with the pain of ecstasy ; . . . and when at last the Grail shows itself in the marvel of undraped reality, . . . the beholder's brain reels — he falls down in a state of adoring annihilation. . . . With chaste rejoicing the angelic host then returns to the heavenly height, fading away into the nothingness whence it first emanated."

But for the Seers of the Gnosis there was a more intimate realization, for they were bidden to cast aside all hesitation and fearlessly to plunge themselves into the very Cup Itself, the Ocean of Divine Love and Wisdom.

This was the Proclamation or Preaching

or Good Tidings, of the Herald of God to men, to those who had the Living Faith they could "ascend to Him who had sent down the Cup," God's Greatest Gift.

By such a Baptism as this, not by a symbolic sprinkling with water, is it that man is to be redeemed. This is the consummation of man's earthly pilgrimage, the realization of the " Gnosis of the Mind, Vision of things Divine ; Godknowledge is it ; for the Cup is God's."

THE " HATING OF THE BODY "

A misunderstanding of this discipline led many of the mystics of the time (and, for a matter of that, has led most of the mystics of all time) to the false belief that the body (or matter generally) was the source of evil. Hence we have all the mortifications and chastisements of the flesh which the monkish spirit introduced into Christendom, and which persist in some quarters even to our own day. Against this the Common Sense of Christianity as a general religion, basing itself on the general utterances of the Christ, has ever protested.

Our mystic philosopher, in urging his disciples to hate the body, apparently does so because they are in the first stages of awakening, and so far have not got the " Mi ad " active in them.

In taking the first steps there must be developed a consciousness of the strong antithesis of good and evil, of love and hate, in order that the will of the disciple may be strengthened towards the good and weakened towards the bad.

When, however, his will is balanced between the two, when he as easily wills good as evil, then, and

not till then, is he prepared to learn the further great lesson: that real wisdom consists in balance, in the Middle Way ; that nothing is evil in itself — the Body is as honourable in its own sphere, as absolutely necessary and indispensable, as is the Mind in its.

He learns the great secret that to have one's thoughts always in heaven is as erroneous as to have them always on earth ; that there is a higher mode of existence, when the things of heaven and earth are within each other, and not apart.

As the Introduction to The Book of the Great Logos according to the Mystery has it:

" Jesus saith : Blessed is the man who knoweth this Word (Logos), and hath brought down the Heaven and borne up the Earth and raised it Heavenwards." 1

Heaven and Earth must kiss each other for this consummation, this truly Sacred Marriage.

And yet in the third Synoptic (xvi. 25, 26) we read :

" Jesus saith : If any man come unto Me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren and sisters, yea, and his own soul also, he cannot be My disciple. "

Here we have precisely the same word " hate " (fjna-el) as in our text. That, however, this " dark saying " was interpreted in a mystical sense by Gnostic tradition, as by no means referring to physical parents but to the past causes of our imperfections, I have already pointed out on several occasions ; we may therefore

conclude that in a gnostic teaching, such as is our treatise, the terms " hate " and " body " are not to be literally interpreted.

" Such are the things that men call good and beautiful, Asclepius — things which we cannot flee or hate."

THE GNOSIS AND ITS BLESSINGS

The claim for the Gnosis is therefore a modest one. The Gnosis is not an end in itself ; it is but the beginning of the True Knowledge of God. They who receive the Baptism of the Mind are made " perfect men," not Perfect ; not until they have received this touch of the Christconsciousness have they reached true manhood.

Those who have received this Baptism know why they have come into being, — the purpose of life. They become consciously immortal; they know they are deathless, they do not only believe it ; their immortality is no longer a belief, it is a fact of knowledge.

They have won their freedom from Death and Fate, and know the real constitution of the cosmos up to the Threshold of the Good, the Plain of Truth— that is to

say, presumably in Buddhist terms, as far as the Nirvanic state of consciousness. Not yet, however, have they entered Nirvana — that is to say, become one with the Logos. They have seen the Sight or Vision of Nirvana, but not entered into the Promised Land, that " Blessed Space," which, as Basilides tells us, " can neither be conceived of nor characterized by any word." l The Vision is an earnest of what they may be. They have become Gods, it is true, already, or, in other words, enjoy the same freedom and consciousness as the Gods or Angels, but there is a still more transcendent state, when they will be atoned with Deity Himself.

THE ANCIENT PATH

Hard as it is to leave the "things we have grown used to," the things habitual, it must be done if we are to enter into the Way of the Gnosis. But no new Path is this, no going forth into new lands (though it may have all the appearance of being so). The entrance on the Path of the Gnosis is a GoingHome, it is a Eeturn — a TurningBack (a True Kepentance). " We must turn ourselves back unto the Old Old Way " (TO. TraXaia KOI apyala).

And for the followers of the Doctrine of Thricegreatest Hermes, this Old Old Path could have meant nothing but the Archaic Wisdom of Ancient Egypt. The Wisdom of Egypt was thus the Gnosis.

THE KEY

OF THRICEGREATEST HERMES

(Text : P. 67-8 ; Pat. 9b-12.)

" God, Father and the Good," then, Tat, hath the same nature, or more exactly, energy.

For nature is a predicate of growth, and used of things that change, both mobile and immobile, that is to say, both human and divine, each one of which He willeth into being.

But energy consists in something else, as we have shown in treating of the rest, both things divine and human things ; which thing we ought to have in mind when treating of the Good.

And though the Cosmos, that is to say the Sun, is also sire himself to them that share in him ; yet so far is he not the cause of good unto the lives, he is not even of their living.

So that e'en if he be a sire, he is entirely so by the compulsion of the Good's Goodwill, apart from which nor being nor becoming could e'er be.

And such a power can be possessed by no one

else than Him alone who taketh naught, but wills all things to be ; I will not, Tat, say makes.

For that the maker is defective for long periods (in which he sometimes makes, and sometimes doth not make) both in the quality and in the quantity [of what he makes] ; in that he sometimes maketh them so many and such like, and sometimes the reverse.

But "God and Father and the Good" is [cause] for all to be. So are at least these things for who can see.

Tat. Thou hast, O father, filled us so full of this so good and fairest Sight, that thereby my mind's eye hath now become for me almost a thing to worship.

For that the Vision of the Good doth not, like the sun's beam, firelike blaze on the eyes and make them close ; nay, on the contrary, it shineth forth and maketh to increase the seeing of the eye, as far as e'er a man hath the capacity

to hold the inflow of the radiance that the mind alone can see.

Not only does it come more swiftly down to us, but it does us no harm, and is instinct with all immortal life.

Her. Yea, may it be, my son! But as it is, we are not jet strung to the Vision, and not as yet have we the power our mind's eye to unfold and gaze upon the Beauty of the GoodBeauty that naught can e'er corrupt or any comprehend.

For [only] then wilt thou upon It gaze when thou canst say no word concerning It. For Gnosis of the Good is holy silence and a giving holiday to every sense.

And shining then all round his mind, It shines

through his whole soul, and draws it out of body, transforming all of him to essence.

For it is possible, my son, that a man's soul should be made like to God, e'en while it still is in a body, if it doth contemplate the Beauty of the Good.

Her. Of every soul apart are transformations, son.

Tat. What meanest thou ? Apart !

Her. Didst thou not, in the General Sermons, hear that from One Soul — the Allsoul — come all these souls which are made to revolve in all the cosmos, as though divided off?

Of these souls, then, it is that there are many changes, some to a happier lot and some to [just] the contrary of this.

Thus some that were once creeping things change into things that in the water dwell, the souls of water things change to earthdwellers, those that live on the earth change into things with wings, and souls that live in air change into men, while human souls reach the first step of deathlessness changed into daimones.

And so they circle to the choir of the Inerrant Gods ; for of the Gods there are two choirs, the

one Inerrant, and the other Errant. And this is the most perfect glory of the soul.

And the soul's vice is ignorance. For that the soul who hath no knowledge of the things that are, or knowledge of their nature, or of Good, is blinded by the body's passions and tossed about.

This wretched soul, not knowing what she is, becomes the slave of bodies of strange form in sorry plight, bearing the body as a load ; not as the ruler, but the ruled. This [ignorance] is the soul's vice.

Tat. But who is such an one, O father mine ?

Her. He who doth not say much or lend his ear to much. For he who spendeth time in arguing and hearing arguments, doth shadowfight. For "God, the Father and the Good," is not to be obtained by speech or hearing.

And yet though this is so, there are in all the beings senses, in that they cannot without senses be.

But Gnosis is far different from sense. For sense is brought about by that which hath the mastery o'er us, while Gnosis is the end of science, and science is God's gift.

Both then come into bodies, [I mean] both things that are cognizable by mind alone and things material. For all things must consist out of antithesis and contrariety ; and this can otherwise not be.

Tat. Who then is this material God of whom thou speakest ?

Her. Cosmos is beautiful, but is not good 3— for that it is material and freely passible ; and though it is the first of all things passible, yet is it in the second rank of being and wanting in itself.

And though it never hath itself its birth in time, but ever is, yet is its being in becoming,

becoming for all time the genesis of qualities and quantities ; for it is mobile and all material motion's genesis.

And head itself moved in a spherelike way — that is to say, as head should move, is mind.

All then that are united to the "tissue" of this " head " (in which is soul) are in their nature free from death, — just as when body hath been made in soul, are things that have more soul than body.

Whereas those things which are at greater distance from this " tissue " — there, where are things which have a greater share of body than of soul — are by their nature subject unto death.

The whole, however, is a life ; so that the universe consists of both the hylic and of the intelligible.

things, while man is second after it, though first of things subject to death.

Man hath the same ensouling power in him as all the rest of living things ; yet is he not only not good, but even evil, for that he's subject unto death.

For though the Cosmos also is not good in that it suffers motion, it is not evil, in that it is not subject unto death. But man, in that he's subject both to motion and to death, is evil.

Spirit pervading [body] by means of veins and arteries and blood, bestows upon the living creature motion, and as it were doth bear it in a way.

For this cause some do think the soul is blood, in that they do mistake its nature, not knowing that [at death] it is the spirit that must first

withdraw into the soul, whereon the blood congeals and veins and arteries are emptied, and then the living creature is withdrawn ; and this is body's death.

Three then are they : " God, the Father and the Good," Cosmos and man.

God doth contain Cosmos ; Cosmos [containeth] man. Cosmos is e'er God's Son, man as it were Cosmos's child.

This is the sole salvation for a man — God's Gnosis. This is the Way Up to the Mount.

By Him alone the soul becometh good, not whiles is good, whiles evil, but [good] out of necessity.

Tat. What dost thou mean, Thricegreatest one?

Her. Behold an infant's soul, my son, that is not yet cut off, because its body is still small and not as yet come unto its full bulk.

Tat. How?

Her. A thing of beauty altogether is [such a soul] to see, not yet befouled by body's passions, still all but hanging from the Cosmic Soul!

But when the body grows in bulk and draweth down the soul into its mass, then doth the soul cut off itself and bring upon itself forgetfulness, and no more shareth in the Beautiful and Good. And this forgetfulness becometh vice.

For when the soul withdraws into itself, the spirit doth contract itself within the blood, and soul within the spirit. And then the mind, stript of its wrappings, and naturally divine, taking unto itself a fiery body, doth traverse every space, after abandoning the soul unto its judgment and whatever chastisement it hath deserved.

Tat. What dost thou, father, mean by this? The mind is parted from the soul and soul from

spirit? Whereas thou said'st the soul was the mind's vesture, and the soul's the spirit.

It is, son, in a body made of earth that this arrangement of the vestures comes to pass. For in a body made of earth it is impossible the mind should take its seat itself by its own self in nakedness.

For neither is it possible on the one hand the earthy body should contain such immortality, nor on the other that so great a virtue should endure a body passible in such close contact with it. It taketh, then, the soul for as it were an envelope.

And soul itself, being too a thing divine, doth use the spirit as its envelope, while spirit doth pervade the living creature.

For earth doth not bear fire ; for it is all set in a blaze even by a small spark. And for this cause is water poured round earth, to be a guard and wall, to keep the blazing of the fire away.

But mind, the swiftest thing of all divine outthinkings, and swifter than all elements, hath for its body fire.

For mind being builder doth use the fire as tool for the construction of all things — the Mind of all [for the construction] of all things, but that of man only for things on earth.

Stript of its fire the mind on earth cannot make things divine, for it is human in its dispensation.

And such a soul when from the body freed, if it have fought the fight of piety — the fight of piety is to know God and to do wrong to no man — such soul becomes entirely mind.

Whereas the impious soul remains in its own essence, chastised by its own self, and seeking for an earthy body where to enter, if only it be human.

For that no other body can contain a human soul ; nor is it right that any human soul should fall into the body of a thing that doth possess no reason. For that the law of God is this : to guard the human soul from such tremendous outrage.

, i.e. in its economy.

Her. What greater chastisement of any human soul can there be, son, than lack of piety ? What fire has so fierce flame as lack of piety ? What ravenous beast so mauls the body as lack of piety the very soul I

Dost thou not see what hosts of ills the impious soul doth bear ?

It shrieks and screams : I burn ; I am ablaze ; I know not what to cry or do ; ah, wretched me, I am devoured by all the ills that compass me about ; alack, poor me, I neither see nor hear !

Such are the cries wrung from a soul chastised ; not, as the many think, and thou, son, dost suppose, that a [man's] soul, passing from body, is changed into a beast.

Such is a very grave mistake, for that the way a soul doth suffer chastisement is this :

And then the impious soul, scourged with its sins, is plunged in murders, outrage, blasphemy, in violence of all kinds, and all the other things whereby mankind is wronged.

But on the pious soul the mind doth mount and guide it to the Gnosis' Light. And such a soul doth never tire in songs of praise [to God] and pouring blessing on all men, and doing good in word and deed to all, in imitation of its Sire.

Further there is an intercourse of souls ; those of the gods have intercourse with those of men, and those of men with souls of creatures which possess no reason.

The higher, further, have in charge the lower ; the gods look after men, men after animals irrational, while God hath charge of all ; for He is higher than them all and all are less than He.

Cosmos is subject, then, to God, man to the Cosmos, and irrationals to man. But God is o'er them all, and God contains them all.

God's rays, to use a figure, are His energies ; the Cosmos's are natures ; the arts and sciences are man's.

The energies act through the Cosmos, thence through the nature-rays of Cosmos upon man ; the nature-rays [act] through the elements ; man [acteth] through the sciences and arts.

He, [Mind,] is the Good Daimon. Blessed the soul that is most filled with Him, and wretched is the soul that's empty of the Mind.

Tat. Father, what dost thou mean, again ?

Her Dost think then, son, that every soul hath the Good [Mind]? For 'tis of Him we speak, not of the mind in service of which we just were speaking, the mind sent down for [the soul's] chastisement.

nor understands, but is just like a thing that hath no reason. Such is the power of mind.

Yet doth it not endure a sluggish soul, but leaveth such a soul tied to the body and bound tight down by it. Such soul, my son, doth not have Mind ; and therefore such an one should not be called a man. For that man is a thing-of-life divine ; man is not measured with the rest of lives of things upon the earth, but with the lives above in heaven, who are called gods.

Nay more, if we must boldly speak the truth, the true " man " is e'en higher than the gods, or at the [very] least the gods and men are every whit in power each with the other equal.

For this cause can a man dare say that man on earth is god subject to death, while god in heaven is man from death immune.

Wherefore the dispensation of all things is brought about by means of these, the twain — Cosmos and Man — but by the One.