CHAPTER III.

The Mysteries continued.

It is necessary that the soul, when purified, should associate
with its Generator. — Porphyry, Aux. to Intelligib.

WE have so far developed the nature of the
internal life only, as it was at first revealed
to the aspirant in the Lesser Mysteries ; and this
was the only popular initiation open to all. It
represented, according to the accounts, a new and
fertile field of natural contemplation which every
one was at liberty to appropriate, and where each
roamed at pleasure without rule or subordination,
and without that consent and sympathy which a
uniformity of life produces.

Previous to the purificative rites little change,
therefore, was effected. It gave a passing experi-
ence to the multitude, and in a few awakened the
desire and hope of better things ; just as amongst
us Mesmerism, which of all modern arts is most
pertinent to this philosophy as working in the same
matter, affords entrance together with the imag-
ination of another life. And more than this, in
well-conditioned cases, we have proof of the
intrinsical intelligence and power of the Free
Spirit which can expatiate into the whole circum-
ference of its sphere and reveal hidden things,
exhibiting a variety of gifts ; it can philosophize
also more or less well according to the direction,
natural purity, and relaxation of the sensual bond.
But not all that men wonder at in the present
day, the insensibility, the cures, the mental
exaltation, nor much more of the same class which
the trance spontaneously develops even in the
best subjects, could satisfy the exacting reason of
our forefathers ; desirous rather to investigate the
Thing itself, the subject of so many marvels, they

The Mysteries. 203

passed the first phenomena to look for Causes,
experimenting within.

Volo ovum philosophorum dissolvere et partes
philosophici hominis investigare, nam hoc est
initium ad alia — says the experimental Friar ;x
and to concentrate the whole vitality, to turn the
spiritual eye, to purify and analyze the total essence
and draw forth the true Efficient and to know it
in coidentity, this was their object and the Art of
Theurgy. For it is not, as they say, that the Spirit
is free from material bondage, or able to range the
universe of her own sphere, that guarantees the
truth of her revealments, or helps the consciousness
on to subjective experience ; for this a concen-
trative energy is needed, and an intellect pene-
trating into other spheres, rather than discursive
in its own.

There are many ways known and practised of
entrancing the senses, and the key of the Hermetic
vestibule may be said to be already in our hands,
which are able to dissolve the sensible medium
and convert it to the experience of another life.2

1 Rog. Bachoni de Mirab. Potest. Artis et Naturse, Ars
Aurifera, vol. ii. p. 342.

2 We adopt the term dissolve here in accordance with the old
doctrine ; varying theories have been proposed to explain the
change that takes place in the vital relationship of the patient
in the mesmeric trance : some have thought the sensible
medium is drawn away by a superior attraction of life in the
agent ; others, that it is overcome, or included, or arrested, or
destroyed ; but the Alchemists, with one accord, say it ought
to be dissolved ; and, in default of better authority, shall we not
suppose it so to be dissolved, or that it ought to be, the alkali
by the acid, the dark dominion of the selfhood by the magnetic
friction of its proper light, the sensible or animal into the vege-
table, the cerebral into the ganglionic life ? Corpora qui vult
purgare oportet fluxa facere, says the author of the Rosarium,
that the compact earthy body of sense may be rarified and flow
as a passive watery spirit. The beginning of the work, says
Albertus Magnus, is a perfect solution ; and all that we teach
is nothing else but to dissolve and recongeal the spirit, to make
the fixed volatile and the volatile fixed, until the total nature
is perfected by the reiteration, both in its Solary and Lunar
form. — Alberti Secret. Tract. Artis Auriferae, p. 130.

204 More Esoteric View.

But the order in which the next solution, or resolu-
tion rather, was operated which was to translate
the consciousness underneath this medium by
obscuration, towards the Central Source, is known
probably to very few in the present day, for it is
entirely concealed from the world : they only,
amongst the ancients who had fulfilled the previous
rites and undergone all the required ordeals, were
entrusted with the passport. It discovers a fearful
mystery in the opening sensation of power, in a
life which, at its entrance, is described as dark,
delusive, and dangerous, and more corrupted far
than the foregoing, but through which it is quite
necessary to pass before inquiry can hope to meet
its object in the Elysian light.

Tenent media omnia sylvse,
Cocytusque sinu labens circumfluit atro.

Betwixt these regions and that upper light,
Deep forests and impenetrable night
Possess the middle space ; the infernal bounds,
Cocytus, with his sable wave surrounds.3

We are aware that the descent to the Infernal
regions and all those highly wrought descriptions
of the poets, concerning the riches and powerful
allurements of Pluto's kingdom and Hades, have
been looked upon, and very naturally, as purely
imaginative, and the representations of the same
in the mysteries as a pictorial or pantomimic show.
But as we have hitherto been enabled to regard
the minor celebrations from an esoteric point of
view, shewing their relationship to more modern
experience and the Hermetic art, we hope to
continue on our adventure, being not without
precedent either or guiding authority over the
same ground. For is it not absurd to suppose that
men should have philosophized and composed so
many excellent and sublime discourses from the
centemplation of shadows only ? But setting aside
such a notion, neither do we conceive that by

3 Dryden's ^neid, lib. vi. 130.

The Mysteries. 205

Hades, or that profound Lethe, the ancients
understood a corporeal nature, or this fleshly
existence of ours, or anything in fact with which
ordinary observation makes us acquainted ; but
the whole allusion is to a state of vital submersion
in the Mysteries, when the consciousness is
artificially drawn about the penetralia of its first
life. Nor, if we may credit accounts, is the descent
difficult, or so far off, but the infernal gates lie
open to mortal men on earth ; but because of the
arduous nature of the re-ascent and for the sake
of securing it, lest unprepared souls, presuming
to enter, should be taken captive by deluding and
fatal desires, and work irremediable evil there,
every precaution has been instituted to keep the
way a secret from the world, as well for its own
sake as for the cause of justice and divine wisdom
about to be revealed ; wherefore the Sybil warns
iEneas of the danger of his undertaking in those
memorable lines.

Facilis descensus Averni ;
Noctes atque dies patet atri janua Ditis :
Sed revocare gradum superasque evadere ad auras,
Hoc opus, hie labor est. Pauci quos sequus amavit
Jupiter, aut ardens evexit ad sethera virtus.,
Diis geniti potuere.4

The grand requirement of the Mysteries after the
first purificative rites (the inclination being
already freed from the dominion and all the super-
ficial progeny of sense), was that the will should
conceive within itself a motive purely rational to
withstand the temptations of its next including
sphere ; that it might be enabled to follow the
true path upward, penetrating through darkness,
and defilements, and dissolution even, to the
discovery of Wisdom in her light abode. To this
iEneas accordingly directed by the Sybil, whom
we follow, after her warning already given, to
search for that well-distinguished, most mysterious
golden bough.

4 JEneid, lib. vi. 126.

206 More Esoteric View.

Aureus et foliis et lento vimine ramus,
Junoni infernse sacer.5

Without which as a propitiation he may not venture
on the subterranean research. But it may be
asked, why this myrtle branch was represented
to be of gold. Not merely for the sake of the mar
vellous, Warburton tells us, we may be assured.
A golden bough was literally part of the sacred
equipage in the shows, a burden which the Ass,
who carried the mysteries, we may believe, was
proud of. But of what kind this branch was,
Apuleius partly indicates in his procession of the
Initiated into the Mysteries of Isis, where we find
it connected with the Mercurial caduceus and
treated as a most important symbol in initiatory
rites ;6 which we therefore understand ontologi-
cally, as a ray of living light, golden and flexible,
the true Brancha Spiritualis of Raymond Lully.
Intellectus naturam habens subtilem ad intelli-
gendum res intelligibiles ;7 — insinuating by rational
penetration alone through the murky circum-
ference of the chloric ether into its own congenial
life, which is Proserpine, and that lapsed soul of
ours, seated in her dark hypostasis unknown ;
whose vapour is so subtile and transient that
nothing but the glance of its proper intellect by
faith can arrest it. And those doves that lead the
way too, are they not known to our Alchemists and
those chosen seats ?

But to be brief ; it is only by exceeding zeal and
piety of intention, such as is ascribed to iEneas in
search of his father, and a prevailing reason, that
the seeking mind becomes fitted for establishment
in her essence and percipient of her final duty to
separate the good and reject the evil therein by
birth allied ; that she may know to what she

5 ^neid, lib. vi. 136.

6 Me tarn, lib. xi.

7 Arbor, X, Seientise Humanalis, p. 99.

The Mysteries. 207

ought to aspire, dismissing every other considera-
tion, where Desires are Images and Will their Act.
Thus Plato says, — It is necessary that a man should
have his right opinion as firm as adamant in him
when he descends into Hades, that there likewise
he may be unmoved by riches or any such like
evils, and may not, falling into tyrannies and such
other practices, do incurable mischiefs and himself
suffer still greater ; but that he may know how to
choose the middle life as to those things, and to
shun extremes on either hand, both in this life
as far as possible and in the whole hereafter.8 And
again, in the Seventh Book of the Republic — He
who is not able by the exercise of his reason to
define the idea of the Good, separating it from
all other objects and piercing, as in a battle,
through every kind of argument, endeavouring
to confute, not according to opinion but according
to essence, and proceeding through all the dialectic
energies with an unshaken reason — he who cannot
accomplish this, neither knows he the Good itself,
nor anything that is properly denominated the
Good. And would you not say that such a one,
if he apprehended any certain truth or image of
reality, would apprehend it rather through the
medium of opinion than of science ; that in the
present life he is sunk in sleep and conversant in the
delusions of dreams ; and that descending into
Hades, before he is roused to a vigilant state, he
will be overwhelmed with a sleep perfectly pro-
found.9 To fall asleep in Hades was indeed to be
absorbed, without the incumbrance of body, in
all its defilements ; according to the philosopher,
the direst evil that can befal any one ; or, as
Virgil has it, — to be a king in hell.

But with all the warnings of difficulties, and

dangers, and death, to be encountered, no hero or

demi-god occurs in the poets, but he sometime

descended to the Infernals, and had free egress

8 Republic, book x. 9 Idem, book vii.

208 More Esoteric View.

thereafter to the Elysian Fields ; but two are
described as suffering for the attempt — Theseus
and Pirithous, who, as Proclus admirably explains,
were detained there — the one because he was too
much a lover of corporeal beauty, the other through
his natural inability to sustain the arduous
altitude of divine contemplation. In the sixth
book of the iEneid, Virgil has gracefully set forth
the whole transaction of his successful hero, with
the labours and difficulties, and appalling visions
that attended on the outset of his pious research ;
all which has been shown by Warburton10 and
other learned commentators, to bear close allusion
to the Mysteries, in which we have reason also to
believe the poet himself was profoundly initiated,
and whose allegoric conduct, therefore, we pursue
as an inquiry of Intellect after its Paternal Source.
To continue, then, in order of the tradition :
after the ordeal rites had been undergone, and the
few who were found fit, selected for further initia-
tion, the concession of more arcane mysteries
succeeded.

Gressus removete prophani

Jam furor humanus nostro de pectore sensus

Expulit.11

As the consciousness passing the middle region,

clear and rational from out the Aquaster, enters

the Fire World, and the Sybil leads her hero to the

dark descent.

Spelunca alta fuit, vastoque immanis hiatu,
Scrupea, tuta lacu nigro nemorumque tenebris ;
Quam super haud ullge poterant impune volantes
Tendere iter pennis : talis sese halitus atris
Faucibus effundens supera ad convexa ferebat,
Unde locum Graii dixerunt nomine Aornum.12

And what does all this imagery point at, but the
thickening darkness of the nether air verging to the
chaos of matter and flowing out from the perpetual

10 Divine Legation, vol. i. p. 345, &c.

11 Claudian de Raptu Proserpinae, sub initio.

12 ^neid, lib. vi. 237.

The Mysteries. 209

motion of the first life ; destitute of elasticity,
Aornus, heavy like that of an enclosed cave, and
vast ; dangerous, as it is said by some, giving
forth a murky odour, like that of graves. It is the
Black Saturn of the adepts, and that appearing
corruption that precedes the mystical death and
regeneration into new life : as describing the same
ens, they call it lapis niger, vilis, fcetens, et dicitur
origo mundi et oritur sicut germinantia. Sendiv-
ogius calls it Urinus Saturni, with which he waters
his lunar and solar plants ; and another, — Ex mari
meo oriuntur nebulae, quae ferunt aquas benedictas
et ipsae irrigant terras et educant herbas et flores.
With this allusion, the Alchemists also call the
Ether their mineral tree ; for they were not so
careful to hide this in general, seeing the true
species was laid asleep in sense, and doubly
locked up, as it were, within both corporeal and
spiritual confines, and how far the world was off
from the art of unfolding or profiting by it. The
reception of iEneas in Hades is next described.

Ecce autem, primi sub lumina solis et ortus,
Sub pedibus mugire solum, et juga coepta moveri
Sylvarum, visseque canes ululare per umbram,
Adventante Dea.13

And Claudian, to the same effect, poetises the

tremendous advent.

Jam mihi cernuntur trepedis delubra moveri
Sedibus, et claram dispergere fulmina lucem
Adventum testata dei : jam magnus ab imis
Auditur fremitus terris, templumque remugit
Cecropium ; sanctasque faces attollit Eleusin ;
Angues Triptolemi stridunt, et squamea curvis
Colla levant attrita jugis
Ecce procul ternas Hecate variata figuras
Exoritur.14

And all this, extravagant and fanciful though it
should appear, has been echoed by philosophers,
and the Greek descriptions agree in each remark-

13 .Eneid, lib. vi. 255.

14 De Raptu Proserpinse, sub init.

210 More Esoteric View.

able particular. Plato, amongst others, likens the
descent of the soul into these oblivious realms of
generation to an earthquake and other strong
convulsions of nature. Psellus, in his valuable
commentary, describes the apparitions procured
by the Chaldaic rites as of two kinds : the first
called super inspection, when he who celebrates the
divine rites sees a mere apparition, as, for instance,
of light in some form or figure, concerning which
the oracle advises, that if any one sees such a light,
he apply not his mind to it, nor esteem the voice
proceeding thence to be true ; sometimes, like-
wise, to many initiated persons, there appear
lights in various forms and figures. These appa-
ritions are created by the passions of the soul, in
performing divine rites, mere appearances, having
no substance, and therefore not signifying anything
true.15 Which vaporous estate of universal-being,
the poets also fabulously concealed under the
satyric form of Pan, who exhibited himself in
every variety of atrocious disguises of wild beasts,
and monsters, and demoniacal appearances, that
he might affright those who would captivate him.

Corripit hie subita trepidus formidine ferrum
iEneas, stric tarn que aciem venientibus offert.
Et ni docta comes tenues sine corpore vitas
Admoneat volitare cava sub imagine formse,
Irruat, et frustra ferro diverberet umbras.16

For it is the imaginative spirit which is the maker
of these images, as in dreams, only more intense.
As moisture condensed in the air constitutes clouds,
which the wind disposes in various forms, so our
pneumatic vehicle, becoming humid and con-
densed beneath her heaven, presents many for-

15 Psellus de Oraculis, 14, 19. See also Oracula Chaldseorum
Demones Sacrificia. Neque naturae, voces per se visible simul-
acrum. Non enim oportet illos te spectare, antequam corpus
sacris purgetur. Quando animas mulcentes, semper a sacris
abducunt. Ergo ex sinibus terrse exiliunt terrestres canes.
Nunquam verum corpus mortali homini monstrantes.

16 ^Eneid, lib. vi. 290.

The Mysteries. 211

midable apparitions to the inner sense, and all the
race of demons, so much celebrated by antiquity,
appear to have their origin in a life of this kind,
viz., from an included vapour of the imagination :
nor these, individually belonging, were seen only ;
but, as it is recorded, each by rapport in this state
becomes conversant with the whole phantas-
magoric universe of his sphere : hence the plati-
tude of the descriptions and poetical crowding of
images to the individual sense. Proclus, comment-
ing on the First Alcibiades of Plato, asserts that
material images, assuming the appearance even
of things divine, constantly attended on the
Mysteries, drawing towards them souls not yet
sufficiently purified, and separating them from
truth. And that such actually appeared to the
Mustai, during the evaporative process of purifi-
cation, and before the lucid vision of the light
within, is further shown in the following passage
of the same experienced theologist. In the most
holy Mysteries, says he, before the presence of the
god, the impulsive forms of certain terrestrial
demons appear, which call the attention off from
undefiled advantages to matter. And again, —
as in the most holy Mysteries, the mystics at first
meet with the multiform and many-shaped genera
which are hurled forth before the gods ; but on
entering the interior part of the Temple, unmoved
and guarded by the sacred rites, they genuinely
receive into their bosom divine illumination, and
divested of their garments, as they would say,
participate of the Divine Nature, the same method
takes place in the speculation of Wholes.17

For the reason of this life imitates, inasmuch
as it is able, and obeys instinctively its motive
light ; and as the natural intellect is liable to error,
so the spiritual also, not yet perfected, is liable
to be caught in the traps of these exterior spirits,

17 Proclus on the Theology of Plato, vol. i. p. 9. De anima
et Demone, throughout.

212 More Esoteric View.

which being, as Basil Valentine, in his Alchemical
Chariot, observes, endowed with senses and under-
standing, know Arts, and have in themselves an
occult operative life ; giving testimony also of
their virtue in the art of healing and other secrets,
by which they deceive and detain the unwary
from the search of better things.18

The writings of the middle ages abound likewise
with descriptions of these demoniacal natures ;
regular classifications of them are given by
Agrippa,19, and Trithemius ;20 and Psellus ;21 Pro-
clus,22, Iamblicus,23 and Porphyry,24 allude to their
material efficacy and operation in Divine Works,
where desire, entering into those aerial forms, is
said to vivify them ; and the Chaldaic oracle
even persuades that there are pure demons. —
Natura suadet esse demonas puros, et malse
materia germina utilia et bona, — and that the
germinations even of evil matter are of use.25
Synesius mentions them also as the progeny of
matter, and as having an energetic virtue, but at
natural war with the truth-seeking soul ;26 and
Proclus, in his Hymn to the Sun, designates them
as

Demons who machinate a thousand ills,

Pregnant with ruin to our wretched souls,

That merged beneath life's dreadful sounding sea

In body's chain they willingly may toil ;

Nor e'er remember in the dark abyss

The splendid palace of their sire sublime.

And it is the dread of such an oblivion there
below that the oracle announces to intellect in

18 Triumphal Chariot of Antimony, Kirchringius, Eng. edit,
p. 16.

19 Occult Philosophy, book ii.

20 De Septem Intelligenti, &c.

21 Michaele Psello de Demonibus.

22 Excerpta M. Ficini ex Grsecis Procli Com. in Alcibiad.

23 De Mysteriis iEgypt-Chaldeor.

24 De Divinis atque Demonibus.

25 Oracula Zoroastri.

26 De Somni.

The Mysteries. 213

those solemn tones — Ducat animse profunditas
immortalis oculosque affatim, — Omnes sursum
extende. Let the immortal depth of thy soul be
predominant, and all thy eyes extend upwards ;
incline not to the dark world whose depth is a
faithless bottom and Hades dark all over, squalid,
delighting in images, unintelligible, precipitous,
and a depth always rolling full of stupidity and
folly.27

Umbrarum hie locus est, somni noctisque soporae.28

If the soul on its departure, says Porphyry, still
possesses a spirit turbid from humid exhalations,
it then attracts to itself a shadow and becomes
heavy ; and a spirit of this kind naturally strives
to penetrate into the recesses of the earth, unless
a certain other cause draws it in a contrary direc-
tion : as, therefore, the soul when surrounded
with this testaceous and terrene vestment neces-
sarily lives on the earth, so likewise when it
attracts a moist spirit, it is necessarily surrounded
with the image. But it attracts moisture when
it continually endeavours to associate with nature,
whose operations are effected in moisture, and
which are rather under than upon the earth : when
however the soul earnestly desires to depart from
nature, {i.e., strives to penetrate centrally without
exploring the intermediate spheres), then she
becomes a dry splendour without shadow and
without a cloud or mist. For moisture gives
subsistence to a mist in the air ; but dryness con-
stitutes a dry splendour from exhalation.29 Hence
that renowned saying of Heraclitus, that a dry
soul is the wisest, for the soul looking at things
posterior to herself beholds the shadow and images
of her vaporous vehicle ; but when she is converted
to herself, she evolves her proper essence and
irradiates the whole circumference with her own

27 Zoroastri Oracula Anima, Corpus, Homo.

28 iEneid, lib. vi. 389.

29 Auxil. to Intelligib. sect. 1

214 More Esoteric View.

abundant oxygenating and dispersive light.30 Thus
Hermes : Extract from the ray its shadow and
its obscurity, by which the clouds hang over it,
and corrupt and keep away the light ; by means
of its constriction, also, and fiery redness it is
burned ; take, my son, this watery and corrupted
nature, which is as a coal holding the fire, which
if thou shalt withdraw so often until the redness
is made pure, then it will associate with thee, b}^
whom it was cherished and in whom it rests.31

Visitabis interiora terrse rectificando, invenies
Occultum lapidem, veram medicinam.

Visit the interiors of the earth rectifying, says the
sage, and thou shalt find the hidden Stone, the true
medicine : not the feculent dead soil, but our dark
divulsed chaotic life from sense, which opened and
rectified, dissolved and reunited, is changed from
an earthly to a spiritual body, by rapport divine.
In such a process it would seem the Alchemists
discovered the hidden principles of nature, as,
experimentally passing through the animal and
vegetable into the mineral circulation of her Law,
they describe the life of all things here below to be
a thick fire imprisoned in a certain incombustible
aerial moisture ; — Ignis ruber super dorsum ignis
candidi — which moisture in its native state, before
it is purified by the inflowing light of reason, is
that Hades we are treating of, the Purgatory of
the wise, wherein the consciousness, becoming
artificially wrapped by the Mysteries, continues
for a while in a state of solicitude and painful
amazement, unable of itself to discover, through
so great a cloud of darkness, that Hypostatic
Reality towards which it is instructed evermore to
aspire. And until this attraction is found and
finally established in union, the opposive powers
display their mutual forces in discordant dissolute
array, as the Alchemists, with all who have been

30 Proclus on the Theology of Plato, book i. cap. iii.
81 Tract. Aur. cap. ii.

The Mysteries. 215

profoundly experienced in this ground, relate
^ach in his own instructive way, warning about
the conduct through it, and the many real, though
chimerical horrors and enticing phantoms that
haunt around, guarding the secret chamber of
their mineral soul. For, as the sage in Enoch
declares it, lead and tin are not produced from
earth as the primary fountain of their production ;
but there is an angel standing upon it, and that
angel struggles to prevail.32

Vaughan notes the same in the Regio Phantastica
of his Hieroglyphic, and elsewhere, speaking of the
mineral nature or First Matter, he says, The eye
of man nes^er saw her twice under one and the
same shape ; but as clouds driven by the wind are
forced to this and that figure, but cannot possibly
retain one constant form, so is she persecuted by
the fire of nature ;33 as, by the re-entering Light
of Reason in the Mysteries, which is that Sulphur
of adepts, causing all this manifold scenery in the
disruption of life. 0 Nature ! the most wonderful
creatrix of natures, cries Hermes, which containest
and separatest all things in a middle principle.
Our Stone comes with light and with light it is
generated, and then it brings forth the clouds, and
darkness which is the mother of all things.34
Raymond Lully, also, in his Compendium of
Alchemy, calls the first principles of the Art,
Spiritus fugitivos in aore condensatos, in forma
monstrorum diversorum et animalium etiam
hominum, qui vadunt sicut nubes, modo hinc
modo illuc ; that is to say, certain fugitive spirits
condensed in the air, in shape of divers monsters,
beasts, and men, which move like clouds hither
and thither.

In an outward acceptation such an announce-
ment of principles would be absurd, or what possible

32 Book of Enoch, chap. lxiv. 7, 8

33 Lumen de Lumine, Introd. Ccelum Teme, page 90 8

34 Tract Aur. cap. iii.

216 More Esoteric View.

interpretation could afford them a place in
common sense ? or whence, if they be true, (and
Lully's name stands well for their defence), were
they so probably brought to the cognizance of the
philosopher, as from the self -inspection of them
in life ? But Lully, indeed, calls these chaotic
forms first principles ; not because they are
permanent or their essence rational, in that
unctuous dark condition, but because within the
material extreme of this life, when it is purified,
the Seed of the Spirit is at last found : which the
adept further describes as being found in the
process a decompounded ens, extremely heavy,
shining through the darkness like a fiery star, being
full of eyes like pearls or aglets. For it is the whole
Demogorgon, as yet not actually animated by
contact of his own returning light. The father of
it, says Vaughan, is a certain inviolable mass, for
the parts of it are so firmly united you can neither
pound them to dust, nor separate them by violence
of fire.35 This is the rock in the wilderness, because
in great obscurity and difficult to find the way of,
compassed about with darkness, clouds, and
exhalations, as it were dwelling in the bowels of
the earth. — Our viscous soul, as Synesius calls it,
circulating in the midst of all her Adamical
defilements, and which Plato compares to that
marine Glaucus so deformed by the foreign weeds
and parasites that had grown about him, that in
every respect he resembled a beast rather than
what he really was.36 In such a deplorable con-
dition is the divine germ of humanity said to be
beheld under the thousand evils of its birth.
Monstrunijhorrendum^nformejingens, cui lumen ademptum.
There is a curious figurative account given in a
letter circulated under the name of the Brethren
of the Rosy Cross, which appears to have reference
to this passage of initiatory progress in the
Mysteries. It may be rendered thus : —

35 Lumen de Lumine, p. 68. 36 Republic, book vii.

The Mysteries. 217

There is a mountain situated in the midst of the
earth or centre of the world, which is both small
and great. It is soft, also above measure, hard, and
strong. It is far off, and near at hand ; but, by the
providence of God, it is invisible. In it are hidden
most ample treasures, which the world is not able
to value. This mountain, by envy of the Devil,
who always opposes the glory of God and the
felicity of man, is compassed about with very cruel
beasts and ravenous birds, which make the way
thither both difficult and dangerous ; and there-
fore, hitherto, because the time is not yet come,
the way thither could not be sought after by all ;
but only by the worthy man's self -labour and
investigation.

To this mountain you shall go in a certain night,
when it comes most long and dark ; and see that
you prepare yourselves by prayer. Insist upon the
way that leads to the mountain, but ask not of any
man where it lies ; only follow your guide who will
offer himself to you and will meet you in the way.37

This guide will bring you to the mountain at
midnight, when all things are silent and dark. It
is necessary that you arm yourself with a resolute
heroic courage, lest you fear those things that will
happen and fall back.38 You need no sword or
other bodily weapon, only call upon your God,
sincerely and heartily seeking Him.

37 Themistius relates how, when entering the mystic dome,
the initiated is seized at first with solicitude and perplexity,
unable to move a step forward, at a loss to find the entrance to
that road which is to lead him to the place which he desires ;
till the conductor laying open for him the vestibule, he enters,
&c. — See Warburton's Divine Legation, the Extract, vol. 1,
p. 309. So the Sybil for iEneas.

Ille ducem haud timidis vadentem passibus sequat.
The adepts, many of them, are at some pains to denote the
peculiar disposition and appearance of this guide, and the
Chaldaic oracle promises that the mortal, approaching to fire,
will have a light from divinity.

38 Nunc animis opus, iEnea, nunc pec tore firmo. ;£neid,
lib. vi. 260.

218 More Esoteric View.

When you have discovered the mountain, the
first miracle that will appear is this ; a most
vehement and very great wind that will shake
the whole mountain and shatter the rocks to pieces.
You will be encountered by lions, dragons, and
other terrible wild beasts ; but fear not any of
these things.39 Be resolute, and take heed that
you return not, for your guide who brought you
thither will not suffer any evil to befall you. As
for the treasure, it is not yet discovered ; but it is
very near. After this wind will come an earthquake
which will overthrow those things which the wind
had left. Be sure you fall not off. The earthquake
being passed, there shall follow a fire that will
consume the earthly rubbish, and discover the
treasure : but as yet you cannot see it.40 After all
these things, and near daybreak, there shall be a
great calm, and you shall see the day-star arise,
and the darkness will disappear ; you will conceive

39 Multaque prseterea variarum monstra ferarum
Centauri in foribus stabulant Scyllseque biformes,
Et centumgeminus Briareus, ac Bellua Lernse
Horrendum stridens, flammisque armata Chimera ;
Gorgones, Harpyiseque et forma tricorporis umbrae.
Corripit hie subita trepidus formidine ferrum
iEneas, strictamque aeiem venientibus offert.

Et ni doeta comes, &c. iEneid, lib. vi. 285.

40 Through fire the divine oracles more plainly teach, that
those strains are all finally obliterated that accede to the soul
from generation and which conceal the immortal principle in
unconscious oblivion for the sake of vivifying the mortal sense.
But the inquisitive light once entering as a ferment combats
and penetrates through the surrounding darkness until
meeting its proper pole, and conjointly kindling with it,
absorbs, transmutes and occultates the surrounding medium
into its own abyssal life. See Tract. Aureus, cap. iv. Burn the
brasen body with an exceedingly strong fire, &c. ; and Eccles.
cap. iv. verse 28. Go forth, and stand upon the mount before
the Lord. And, behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and
strong wind rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks
before the Lord ; but the Lord was not in the wind : and after
the wind an earthquake ; but the Lord was not in the earth-
quake ; and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in
the fire; and after the fire, a small still voice.- 1 Kings xix.11-12.

The Mysteries. 219

a great treasure ; the chiefest thing, and the most

perfect, is a certain exalted tincture with which

the world, if it served God and were worthy of

such gifts, might be tinged and turned into most

pure gold.

And thus much of the concordance of these

famous Christian philosophers who, if they had not

promised gold, and proclaimed prodigies after an

entertaining Arabian Nights' fashion, would never,

probably, have been thought of by the world, or

inquired after, as they were, over Europe during

the last century, but without success. For they

who have this knowledge know where and how

likewise to bestow it, discerning betwixt the lovers

of mammon and of truth. Fearing the dangerous

curiosity of the vulgar herd also, we observe, the

Greeks pass by in silence the physical revealments

of these Tartarean realms, or, poetizing the great

experience, evaporate in fancy, as it were, the

teeming life therein opened with its overflowing

spirit and light of increase.

Let none admire
That riches grow in hell ; that soil may best
Deserve the precious bane ; and here let those
Who boast in mortal things, and wondering tell
Of Babel and the works of Memphian kings,
Learn how the greatest monuments of fame
And strength and art are easily outdone
By spirits reprobate.41

And further, how these again may be surpassed
and vanish, as Aladdin's rapid castle into air,
before the discriminate radiance of celestial light.
And as in the pursuit of other sciences and arts,
thought, and persevering labour and experience
are required to ensure success, so should those
delusive visions and errors which occur during the
conscious transference to a more excellent condi-
tion of being be considered, in like manner, not
as derogatory or casting a doubt at all upon the
ultimate truths of divine science, but as obstacles
41 Milton's Paradise Lost, book i. 676.

220 More Esoteric View.

rather contrary to it, as evil is to good everywhere
adverse.

We do not, therefore, linger here any more to con-
sider the different allotments, the longer or shorter
periods which engage pure or impure souls in
Hades, their habits or the triple path arising from
their essences, all which is indicated in the Platonic
discourses, and most of which abound with sym-
bolical theories and poetical descriptions con-
cerning the descent, ascent, and intermediate
wanderings, expiatory punishment and sacrifices
and things of a similar import, which the rites
enjoined, before the aspirants, by the Greeks
called Mustai, were passed on by the Hierophant
of the inner temple to its immortal abode : for
such was Tartarus, the next beyond Hades, accord-
ing to the Ethnics, the alone eternal hypostasis to
be redeemed from thence, from the oblivious realms
of generation, into the Elysian recollection
of Wisdom in the highest consciousness. But
the soul is said to be in Hades all the while
that her hypostasis continues in darkness ; that
is, we would say, whilst she regards her image
objectively, before attaining to the experimental
knowledge. And here the Lesser Mysteries
ended ; the soul, as it were, on the borders of the
Stygian lake in view of Tartarus, which Euripides
has elegantly styled also " a dream of death."

And the conformity between death and this next
initiation, is strikingly exhibited in a passage
preserved by Stobceus from an ancient record ; it
has been well rendered bv Dr. Warburton, and
runs thus : — The mind is affected and agitated
in death, just as it is in initiation into the Grand
Mysteries. And word answers to word, as well
as thing to thing : for TEAEVTAN is to die, and
TEAEI20AI is to be initiated ; the first stage
is nothing but errors and uncertainties ;
labourings, wanderings, and darkness. And now,
arrived on the verge of death and initiation,

The Mysteries. • 221

everything wears a dreadful aspect ; it is all horror
trembling, sweating, and affrightment. But this
scene once over, a miraculous and divine light
displays itself, and shining plains, and flowery
meadows, open on all hands before them. Here
they are entertained with hymns and dances, and
with sublime and sacred knowledges, and with
reverend and holy visions. And now become
perfect and initiated, they are free, and no longer
under restraint ; but crowned and triumphant,
they walk up and down in the regions of the
Blessed.42

But all, during the transition, is described as
wearing a fearful aspect ; and dread fills the soul
about to relinquish her natal bond in life ; neither
may it be irrelevant to call in mind that repeated
advice of Solomon, that — the fear of God is the
beginning of Wisdom ; — as the spiritual regard in
the mysteries, already involuted, and drawing
towards its end, with awe, begins to perceive itself
in that Identic Source. And shall we not believe
that it was out of the same intimate experience
that the son of Sirach, inciting men to search after
the Divine Wisdom, confesses, that — at first she
will walk with him by crooked ways, and bring
fear and dread upon him, and torment him with
her disciplines, until she may trust his soul, and
try him by her law ? Then she will return the
straight way unto his, says the Divine teacher, and
comfort him, and show him her Secret. The root
of Wisdom, is to fear the Lord, and the branches
thereof are long life ; strive for the truth, even
unto death, and the Lord shall fight for thee.43
So, likewise, we read, that there is in Alchemy a
certain noble body, which is moved from one lord
to another ; in the beginning of which there is
suffering with vinegar ; but, in the end, joy with
exaltation. O happy gate of Blackness ! cries the

42 Divine Legation, vol. i. p. 342.

43 Ecclesiasticus, chap. i. v. 20 ; chap. iv. v. 17, 18, 28.

222 More Esoteric View.

adept, which art the passage to so glorious a
change ! Study, therefore, whoever appliest thy-
self to this art, only to know this secret ; for to
know this, indeed, is to know all, but to be ignorant
of this, is to be ignorant of all. Take away, there-
fore, the vapour from the water, and the blackness
from the oily tincture, and death from the fazces ;
and by Dissolution thou shalt possess a triumphant
reward, even that in and by which the possessors
live.44

In the beginning of Phcedo, Plato, by Socrates,
asserts, that it is the business of philosophers to
study how to be dead. Plotinus, at the same time
reprobating suicide, has the same doctrine ; but
Porphyry, in his Auxiliaries to the Perception of
Intelligible Natures, explains the meaning of these
others ; for there is, says he, a twofold death, the
one indeed universally known, in which the body
is liberated from the soul ; but the other peculiar
to philosophers, in which the soul is liberated from
the body : nor does the one entirely follow the
other. That which nature binds, nature also
dissolves ; that which the soul binds, the soul
likewise can dissolve : nature, indeed, binds the
body to the soul, but the soul binds herself to the
body. Nature therefore liberates the body from
the soul, but the soul may also liberate herself from
the body.45 That is to say, if she know how, and
have the right disposition awarded, she may
dissolve her own conceptive vehicle, even the
parental bond, and return consciously (the ele-
mentary principles remaining, nor yet suffered
to depart), under the dominion of another law to
life. That was the way to " precious death,"
spoken of by the Hebrews and Academics, this the
" happy gate of blackness " celebrated by the old
adepts, the " head of Hermes' crow," which is in

44 Hermes, Tract. Aur. cap. ii. Ripley Revived, 5th gate,
p. 357.

45 Aux. to Intell. sect. 1, 8, 9.

. The Mysteries. 223

the beginning of the work ; that which was fixed,
viz., the sensual compact, is dissolved, and that
which is dissolved is renovated, and hence the
corruption and evil of mortality is made manifest
in the ultimate circulation of the matter to be
renewed, and on either side it is a signal of Art.
And all without destruction to the mortal body
(if perhaps some one values this,) the willing life
was made to pass out of its present oblivious fall,
through regeneration, into the reminiscent con-
sciousness of her Causal Source. As the truth-
telling Oracle again declares that,

If thou extend the fiery mind to the work of piety,
Thou shalt preserve the fluxible body likewise.

Even through death, re-entering into and fortifying
it with the elixir of an immortal life. Orandum est
ut sit mens sana in corpore sano.

Seek thou the way of the soul,

Whence and by what order, having served the body,
The same from which thou dost flow, thou must return
And rise up again, joining action to sacred speech.46

Suppose any one beginning at the top of an

artificial edifice, should undertake to decompose

it stone by stone, setting all aside, with the dirt

and rubbish, as he proceeds, he would at last come

to the earth which is at the foundation, and have

space to build up anew ; and thus it would appear

to be in the Hermetic process. If any one should

take the natural life as it presents itself, opening

and analyzing the parts thereof, spiritually and

wisely, one from another, graciously, as the

mandate runs, — Terra ab igni, subtile a spisso,

suaviter cum multo ingenio, — he would arrive

finally at the basement, wherein is hidden the true

alkaline original of life in its threefold essence

separately contained. And this, the adept tells

us, is the syllogism it best behoves us to look

after ; for he that has once passed the Aquaster,

and entered the Fire World, sees what is both

46 Oracula Chaldaica.

224 More Esoteric View.

invisible and incredible to common men. He shall
discover the miraculous conspiracy that is between
the Prester and the Sun, the external and internal
fire of life, the thing desiring and the thing desired.
He shall know the secret love of heaven and earth,
and why all influx of fire descends against the
nature of fire, and comes from above downwards,
until having found a body, it reascends therewith
in perpetual interchange. He shall know, con-
tinues the adept, and see how the Fire Spirit has
its root in the spiritual fire earth, and receives from
it a secret influx upon which it feeds. A body
immarcessible, than which there is nothing more
ancient, vigorous, and young. The Salt of Saturn,
that most abstruse principle of the Stone — the
most ancient Demogorgon — sethere dempto — de-
prived of light, whose perpetual motion emanates
the first material universe, and is the mineral soul.
This is the earth, distinguished by Anaxagoras,
which abiding durably in the centre, ' hangs
loftily," but its Being is Tartarus ;

And the light hating world, and the winding currents

By which many things are swallowed up.
Stoop not down, for a precipice lies below in the earth ;
Drawing thro' the ladder which hath seven steps,
Beneath which is the throne of Necessity.
Enlarge not thou thy destiny,
The soul will, after a manner, clasp God to herself.47

As Porphyry, in our motto head, declares that —
it is necessary that the soul when purified should
associate with its Generator ; and the virtue of
it after this conversion is said to consist in a
scientific knowledge of true Being, which cannot
be obtained either otherwise or without such a
conversion.

O beatam quisquis felix gnarus Dei
Sacrorum, vitam piat ;
Ac animam initiat Orgygis
Bacchans in montibus,
Sacris purus lustrationibus.48

47 Oracula Chaldaica. 48 Euripides in Bacchis.

The Mysteries. 225

But, perhaps, inquisitive reader, you will very
anxiously ask, what was said and done ? I would
tell you, replies the Epidaurian, if it could be
lawfully told. But both the ears and tongue are
guilty of indiscretion. Nevertheless, I will not
keep you in suspense with religious desire, nor
torment you with a long continued anxiety. Hear
therefore, but believe what is true ; The priest,
then, all the profane being removed, taking me by
the hand, brought me to the penetralia of the
temple. / approached the confines of death, and,
having trod the threshold of Proserpine, I returned
from it, being carried through all the Elements. At
midnight I saw the Sun shining with a splendid
light ; and I manifestly drew near to the gods above
and beneath, and proximately adored them. Behold
I have narrated to you things of which, though
heard, it is nevertheless necessarv that you should
be ignorant.49

By no explanation, nor any familiar analogy do
we here presume to aid the natural intellect to a
conception that transcends it, and which can only
be attained through the identical experience. Yet
reason may, does perceive it, but abstractly only
as an inference ; yet it is her true Hypostasis, for
which, as Isis for Osiris, she is constantly seeking,
her objective reality in the Great Unknown. The
rude, uneducated reason, however, which serves
sensibles without reflection, will not understand ;
bat that only which, seeing something more in
causation than mere antecedence, can reflect
into the intelligible substance of her Law. For
there the true Efficient is to be found, which is
not externally developed ; but, becoming con-
joined in consciousness, the soul knows herself as a
Whole which before knew but a part only of her
human nature ; and proceeding thus, by theurgic
assistance, arrives at her desired end, and parti-
cipating of Deity, perceives then and knows, as
49 Apuleius Metam, book xi.

226 More Esoteric View.

Plotinus gracefully expresses it, that the supplier
of life is present ; and free from all external
perturbation and desire, percipiently included in
the circular necessity of her Law, believes its
revelation which is her very self.

This is the Introspection which Psellus speaks of,
as distinguished from the Superinspection which
takes place in Hades. When the initiated person
sees the Divine Light itself without any form or
figure ; this the oracle calls Sacro Sancto, for that
is seen with a beauty by sacred persons, and glides
up and down pleasantly through the depths of
the world. This will not deceive ; but as the
Oracle in fine advises,

When thou seest a Fire without Form,
Shining flashingly through the depths of the World,
Hear the voice of Fire.50

The same solemn and articulate instruction is
given in an Indian record, translated by Sir
William Jones, as follows : — Except the First
Cause, whatever may appear or may not appear
in the mind, know that to be the mind's may a
(or image or delusion) as of light or darkness ; as
the great elements are in various beings entering,
3^et not entering, thus AM I, in them and yet
not in them ; even thus far may inquiry be made
by him who seeks to know the principle of mind
in union and separation, which must be every
where and always.51 And in the book of Deuter-
onomy, fourth chapter, the unfigured form of
the Divine Essence, is noted in several places ; and
in the book of Zohar, it is explained, that before
the descent into creation Divinity has no form,
and therefore it was forbidden to represent Him
under any image whatever, even so much as a

50 Quando videris forma sine sacram igneam

Collucentum saltatim totius per profundum mundi,
Audi Ignis Vocem.

Oracula Chaldaica, in fine.
61 Asiatic Researches, vol. i. p. 241.

The Mysteries. 227

letter or point, and in this sense we are to under-
stand the mandate, — Take good heed unto your-
selves, for ye saw no manner of similitude on the
day that the Lord spake unto you in Horeb out
of the midst of the fire.52

But then the revelations we have here gathered
(and which are but a small part indeed of what has
been described of the visions, and awful accompani-
ments which took place in the celebration of the
Greater Mysteries) have been explained away as
trifling exhibitions ; orreries, as some say, con-
trived after the fashion of Walker's or Lloyd's
Eidouranion ; by those unfigured lights, it has
been argued, were meant asteroids, whilst the
figured are supposed agreeably to represent con-
stellations of stars, grouped together in a more
defined form. The whole, in fact, has been regarded
as a moving panorama and illusory display of
lights. But what extreme of trifling or fantastic
folly has not modern imagination ascribed to the
ancient mind ? and how commonly mistaken and
useless do not its best relics remain, for want of a
corresponding intelligence in latter times ? Alle-
gories of recondite experience, truthful fables,
symbols replete with instruction and refined
emblems of art, have been either trivially inter-
preted, or condemned as futile without appeal ;
even those life-bound mysteries, those disciplines,
purifications, sacred and primordial rites have
gone for nothing, or as good for nothing, whilst
Astronomy has been the imputed spirit of the
whole.

On risk of some ridicule, therefore, and dilet-
tanti scorn, we continue by our clue, leaving the
darker scenes of life's drama, to look beyond,
even upon that beautiful sun-lit horizon of the
Maudaurentian, rising to intellectual radiance, as
of the real life. Thus Proclus says, that to the wise
indeed all things possess a silent and arcane
52 Deuteronomy, chap. iv. v. 15. Zohar, part ii.

228 More Esoteric View.

tendency ; and Intellect is excited to the Beau-
tiful with astonishment and motion : for the
illumination from it and its efficacy, acutely
pervade through every soul, and as being the most
similar of all things to the Good, it converts every
soul that surveys it. The soul also, beholding that
which is arcane, shining forth as it were to view,
rejoices in and admires that which sees, and is
astonished about it. And as in the most holy
Mysteries, prior to the mystic spectacles, those who
are initiated are said to be seized with astonish-
ment and dread, so in Intelligibles, prior to the
participation of the Good, Beauty shining forth
astonishes those that behold it, converts the soul
to itself, and being established in the vestibules
(of the good) shows what that is which is in the
adyta, and what the transcendency is of occult
being. Through these things, therefore, concludes
the philosopher, let it be apparent whence Beauty
originates, and how it first shines forth, and also
that Animal (life) itself is the most beautiful of
all intelligibles.53 But Apuleius no less directly
indicates the nature of his own mysterious revela-
tion where, speaking of the Intellectual contact
which the wise have proved, when they were
separated from body, through the energies of mind,
he says, (calling his divine master also to witness),
that this knowledge sometimes shines forth with
a most rapid coruscation like a bright and clear
light in the most profound darkness.54 And Plato
himself, speaking in like manner of the Intellectual
Intuition, in his seventh Epistle, writes from
long converse with this thing itself, accompanied
by a life in conformity to it, on a sudden a light,
as it were a leaping fire, will be enkindled in the
soul, and will there itself nourish itself.55 And
heaven, he adds in another place is the kindled

53 Proclus on the Theology of Plato, vol. i. book iii. chap, xviii.

54 On the God of Socrates, in init.

55 Epistle vii. ; >' Taylor, vol. v.

The Mysteries. 229

intelligence of the First Intelligible, and sight
looking to things above is heaven.56 And the sense
of sight is celebrated by all these, therefore, as not
only beautiful and useful for the purposes of this
life ; but as a leader in the acquisition of Wisdom.
For is it not that very light which in us looks out
beaming in our eyes that, directed within, and
being purified also, and scientifically inquiring,
discovers at last that other light which is the
substance of its own, until light meeting light
apprehends itself alone ?

While thro' the middle of life's boisterous waves,
Thy soul robust the deep's deaf tumult braves,
Oft beaming from the god's thy piercing sight,
Beholds in paths oblique a sacred light.
Whence rapt from sense with energy divine,
Before her eye immortal splendors shine,
Whose plenteous rays in darkness most profound,
Thy steps directed and illumined round.
Nor was the vision like the dreams of sleep,
But seen whilst vigilant you brave the deep ;
While from your eyes you shake the gloom of night,
The glorious prospect bursts upon your sight.57

Open the compound creature ; look upon the
elements ; divide the elements, and vou shall find
the quintessential nature : open this, continues
the adept, and you shall conceive the subtle
altereity of the angelical spirit in which is the
divine act, and immediate beam or Wisdom from
God. In this work, therefore, there concurreth
in the separation of the first, a sensible aspect, in
the other we behold with intellectual eyes, so that
you may observe how all is in everything, and
everything in all. As Hermes alludes : Qui
fornacem cum vase nostro construit, novum
mundum conflat. He that maketh a furnace with
our glass to it maketh a new world ;58 — a new
hypostasis, and a new stone, — even that Stone

56 The Cratylus, and in Timeas.

57 Porphyry's Hymn to Plotinus, Select Works, Preface.

58 See Fludd's Mosaica, circa medio.

230 More Esoteric View.

of the Apocalypse, the true crystalline rock with-
out spot or darkness, that renowned Terra Maga
in sethere clarificata, which carries in its belly wind
and fire. Having got this fundamental of a little
new world, says Vaughan, unite the heaven in
triple proportion to the earth, and then apply a
generative heat to both, and they will attract from
above the star-fire of nature. So hast thou the
glory of the whole world, therefore let all obscurity
flee before thee.59 This is the true Astrum Solis
gotten and conceived, the mineral spiritual Sun
which is the Perpetual Motion of the wise, and
that Saturnian Salt which, developed to intellect
and made erect, subdues all nature to his will.
For it is the whole Demogorgon, now actually
animated, which before was made visible without
its subject light ; but at length becoming ignited,
reflects from out the dark abyss of being, as a
luciferous wheel, with its radiant sections, all
comprehending in their Law, as the Oracle again
proclaims,

Fire, the derivation and dispenser of Fire,
Whose hair pointed is seen in his native Light :
Hence comes Saturn.
The Sun Assessor beholding the Pure Pole.

And this we take to be that midnight Sun of
Apuleius, the ignited Stone of Anaxagoras, (for
which that philosopher has suffered such abundant
disrepute, under error that his allusion was to the
luminary of this world). This is the triumphal
Chariot of Antimony, the Armed Magnet of
Helvetius turned swiftly about the current axle
of life, which is the Wheel of Fire signalized in
Ezekiel, seen by the Hebrew prophets, Moses,
David, and Zachariah ; the Fiery Chariot of the
Kabalah, called Mercaba, in which all things are
transfigured ; and this is the Stone with the new
name written in the Revelation and that Salt
which the Saviour orders that we should have it in

59 Anima Magia, p. 50 ; Tabula Smaragdina Hermetis.

The Mysteries. 231

ourselves ; and is the same with the Prester of
Zoroaster which in the Chaldean sense means the
Fire Spirit of Life, and is that Identity in all which
sustains all by the efflux of His power — the super-
natural centre of every living thing, the -infinitely
powerful and all-efficient making power.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word
was with God, and the Word was God. The same
was in the beginning with God. All things were
made by Him ; and without Him was not any
thing made that was made. In Him was Life ;
and the Life was the Light of men. And the Light
shineth in Darkness and the Darkness compre-
hended it not.60

And that Light shining in darkness, if men had
never known, how should they have asserted, do
theologians invent such things in the present day ?
Neither did they formerly invent, but what they
knew and had seen, declared. — To as many as
received the Spirit to them gave He power to
become the sons of God, which were born not of
blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will
of man, but of God. — This therefore is that Power
which is hidden in man, the true Light which
lighteth every man that cometh into the world,
if haply one might feel after Him and find Him.
An enchanted treasury known only to the wisely
simple who have subdued their will to the Law
of Wisdom, as Abraham did, as soon as he had
gotten the creature into his hands.61

We omit many things here relating to the mysti-
cal death and regeneration, which may be better
understood when we come to treat of the manifest-
ation of the Philosophic Subject ; adding merely
at present, in conclusion from our doctors, that
the grand perfection of their Art was to multiply
the Prester and place him in the most supreme
Ether, which is that Augean palace already

60 St. John's Gospel, cap. i.

61 Sepher Jezirah, in fine.

232 More Esoteric View.

prepared for him in the beginning ; where, as in a
suitable habitation, he abides shining, not burning
as below, or wrathful ; but vital, calm, trans-
muting, recreating, and no longer a Consuming
Fire. Intellige in scientia et sapias intelli-

GENTIA : EXPERIRE IN ILLIS, ET INVESTIGA ILLA,
ET NOTA, ET COGITA, ET IMAGINARE, ET STATUE REM
IN INTEGRITATE SUA ET FAC SEDERE CrEATOREM
IN THRONO SUO.62

H2 Idem, Liber de Oeatione, Authore Abraham, cap i.

The Mysteries. 233