or Prophesying c. Also He that prophesieth let him prophesie according to the proportion of Faith 2. But this Question intending chiefly things to come we must say There are two sorts of False and two sorts of true Prophets viz First to describe the false 1 They are such as do Lying Wonders and predict Events of Publick and Private Importance going no farther than into the imaged formed word the occult qualities of Nature and outward Causes and Consequents contracted to wonderful Good and Evil Uses into which Satan can easily insinuate himself 3. 2. Such as have a Spirit of Prophesie but not a Spirit of Holiness such was Balaam and such the Lord mentions who shall say Lord Lord we have prophesied in thy Name c. And these have their Water out of the Fountain but receive and keep it in foul Vessels God is so bountiful a House-keeper that his Wine is given running over so that some falls into such Mensold Bottles 4. 3. The Children of Wisdom the regenerated holy ones who live in God and have their Names written in the Book of Life having Divine senses opened These Prophesies according to their proportion of Faith for Love and Faith begot them They prophesie of their own Death which comes to pass for they die daily they are Priests and Prophets what they want in skill and Power they have in love to his Service These as Prophets and Priests shall have boldness in the day of the Lord which they wait for being Children of the day and are true Prophets yet without that Gift of Prophecy this Question levels at and yet of these it is said the Spirits of the Prophets are subject to the Prophets 5. 4. Those of the Lord 's Holy ones who are gifted by the Spirit of Prophecy some more eminently familiarly frequently and as it were continually before whom the Doors of the spiritual World lye Night and Day wide open 6. They as Watchmen see the contest of the Properties and what weight of sin over-ballanceth the contra-ponderating Wrestlers for the Magical Power of their Souls uniteth with the Universal as the Tincture of Gold doth with the Sun's Tincture they as evidently see the Displeasure of the Almighty as by Man's face may his delight or dislike of any extream occurrence be discerned 7. This is so intimate that the Lord saith he doth nothing but what he tells or shews to his Servants the Prophets For as there is but one God and his Spirit is but one and that Man is a compleat Image of the whole Almighty God and having the Work of that one Spirit begetting in him the true Divine second Principle he can as clearly when gifted to this distinct office hear and see the Power whence himself and all things are as a Glass can reflect a Face for all lyes in himself though like Hagar we see not the Fountain till God's Angel shew it though it be as that in and before us For such a Man is as a well tun'd Musical Instrument the Sounds are all distinct ready when ever the Spirit of God shall play on it And the simile sutes well for Man's original Numbers and Measures answer exactly to the Number of the Notes in Musick which are 3 and 7 and not one more or less and this Harmony is signified in the Harp Organ c. used in the legal Administration 9. And as Men are affected with the elevating of the Airs to Delight and with the solemnity into seriousness with the harshness into regret and with the solid composure into excess of Melancholy so ought all to be with the Lord's Voice in his Prophets 10. To such it is shewn many times what time place manner and other circumstances may sitly hide the Lord 's redeemed ones if the Decree be not gone forth for they see where when and how the Destroyer comes by which such may escape who are not to witness by their Blood and be Crown'd with Martyrdom 11. Some have been Leaders as Moses Deliverers and Judges as Samuel c. And as a figure of the Heavenly Worlds concurrence and assistance to the Magical Vertue of the faithful Soul was the Oracle near the Mercy Seat the Urim and Thummim Ephod c. Some have been Prophets for more private and particular Occasions as Agabus c. 12. We are farther to know he that liveth the Life of Jesus Christ lives at the Fountain of Wisdom having all the Principles and Properties in due subordination to the Divine Life whereby he knows God the Creation Heavenly Hellish the Out-world and Himself 13. Yet all this in part he comprehends not that wherewith himself is comprehended he seeth a part of every thing but not the whole of any part As a Mathematician hath a true distinct knowledge of both Globes which he can describe and measure while yet he knoweth not fully that spot of Earth whereon his Feet tread 14. And though the Natural Philosopher penetrateth much farther and the Divine Philosopher deepest of all yet how little a part know we of him even of things existent how much less of Futurities 15. And if Daniel heard the Angel praying How long wilt thou not have Compassion on Jerusalem against whom thou hast had Indignation these threescore and ten years and if the Lord Jesus said of that day and hour knoweth no man no not the Son which I submissively understand to be meant thus viz. 16. Not the Son as he is the opened Treasure of Grace and Love of the second Principle but the Father that is as he is the secret Treasure of the Justice and Vengeance of the first Principle How very little and poor is the utmost faln Man's Race can attain 17. But hence we discern that the Knowledge and Spirit whence the Prophets in the Old Testament did Prophesie Good was by the Spirit in them opening those things out of the second Principle and the Spirit and Knowledge whence the Prophets either brought Evil Denunciations which should succeed was out of the first wrath Principle or by which they call'd down immediate Evil as Eliah the Fire was the same 18. But that it might not as a Coal burn the hand of the Bearer it was wrapt up in the Prophets holy Divine second Principle 19. For as it is hard for a Captain who hath Personal Enemies in the adverse Camp to carry on his Force vigorously and at the same time pursuing his Success wholly lay aside the Sentiments of all personal private Wrongs so is it hard for a Prophet to bring the Turba on others without his own entring into it either before in or after the stroak How needful is it therefore that sinful men should be inhibited to revenge themselves Q. 102. What is Christ of whom the Prophets Prophesied in the Old Testament The Seventh grand Distribution A. According to the constant design of avoiding Repetitions the Answer of this Question is referr'd to the review and perusal of
Glorious second Person as before And yet that by taking the Humanity from the Virgin Mary He really became what he was not before viz. a real Son of Man with a true Humane Soul Body and Spirit as we are and capable to Suffer and Die 14. We are to know the Humane Nature or Creature in the Ascention and Glorification was not swallowed up by the Divine Nature as a flame of a Candle is by the Sun extinguish'd But the Humane Nature now Glorified remains for ever a Glorified Body being the same true individual Humane Nature or Man which was Crucified Dead Buried and raised up by his Almighty Power as the first Fruit Original and Author of the General Resurrection 15. That the Lord Jesus Christ who in the Womb of the Virgin became as truly a Man as we are who have our Souls Spirits and Bodies propagated by our immediate Parents Yet that besides the infinite Dignity of his Almightiness as the second Person and Son of God by Eternal Generation which united Himself to His created Humane Soul Spirit and Body I say besides all this He was the true created Son of God and so was a true Heavenly Man and a Virgin of Holiness Purity and Modesty And so begotten by the Holy Ghost 16. In which respect He was no Son of Man even as neither was the first Adam but as truly the Son of God by Creation as with respect to His Godhead He was by Eternal Generation And though the words Thou art my Son this day I have begotten thee may be understood of the Eternal Generation for the Father ceaseth not to beget His Eternal Son from Eternity and in Eternity yet the words may well be applicable to this Heavenly Humanity whereof both David and Paul speak 17. But because this 12th Note last asserted is hard to be understood since Man's Fall partly because it is of so Noble Extraction and seeming to be of so rare mention in the Holy Scriptures so remote from Sense and Man's dull Apprehension of so excellent Nature and so highly profitable and advantageous to be known Also that the penetrating into the Knowledge of it requires Divine Wisdom enlightned Understanding it calleth for highest Attention as that plainly teacheth the Way God took and still taketh for recovery of lost Mankind It is farther clear'd by what follows more especially by the following Pag. 32. in Chap. 22. 18. We ought to know that the Divine Substance which United to it the Essences of the Humane Soul in Mary came not thither descending from the highest Heaven or great Local Distance But the Word which God inspake again in Paradice imaging it Self in the Light of Man's Life and waiting in all the Holy Men being the Word of Divine Wisdom out of the Tincture of the Holy Element which is every where and pure before God that Word took to it for an Eternal Propriety the Essences of Man's Soul in and of Maries Virgin Matrix Not entring in but unlocking ingenerating and unshutting what Adam had bolted up in Death 19. That though this Word were not the Almighty second Person of the Trinity yet was it the Word of Wisdom which Adam turned from and in disobeying it he and we all rebel against God more immediately than if we should stubbornly reject the Command of an Angel of God This Word of Divine Wisdom is a Virgin of Purity and here became the Bride to the Humane Soul for as the Soul had the Tincture of the Fire This brought the Tincture of the Light and the Uniting of the Heavenly Image of Purity to the Image that was Impure did Tincture the Fire-Soul and both became one Self-subsisting Eternal Man 20. We are also to know That for asmuch as the two Tinctures were at the instant of the Virgin Maries saying Be it unto me c. United and were become One Man the Image the first Man did bear yet seeing the Fire-Soul did once treacherously choose an Earthy Lust instead of Divine Love 21. To the end it might be now powerfully Tinctured no more to recede and that the whole Humane Nature might be led through Death into Eternal Life therefore did the Lord mighty to save take the whole Man by being Bridegroom to the Virgin Sophia and for that the Man or Creature stood in the Holy Element which is pure and every where yet is the same Element Inferior to Omnipotence it was needful Grace and Love should Unite the Creature to the Deity which raised it above all it lost in the first Adam 22. For the Lord became as a Servant to advance and secure his Servant both the Image it once had and add to it more which will be the stupendious Contemplation of Eternity but all this by the Lord's Incarnation was brought to pass 23. So that here was One and that One consisted of the true Almighty Son of God and the Holy Virgin of Wisdom the Tincture of the Light viz. His Heavenly Flesh and Blood Also of the Essences of Man's Eternal Soul the Temporary Astral Soul and Elementary Body So that not only the Eternal Fire-Soul is meekened nourished and fed to live Eternally but the outward Soul and Elementary Body are secured of a Resurrection by the raising of the Holy Astral and Elementary Body of the Lord Jesus Christ the first Fruits of them that slept leaving nothing unraised but the Linnen Cloaths in the Sepulchre CHAP. XXII Of the Heavenly New Man or Divine Humanity of Jesus Christ what it is where it is and how to be participated of by us IT is written That ye put off c. the Old Man v. 23. and be renewed c. and v. 24 that ye put on the New Man which after God is created in Righteousness and true Holiness Q. What is This New Man which we are to put on A. It is Jesus Christ as it is written put on the Lord Jesus Christ c. so are we said to be cloathed upon with our House which is from Heaven call'd a Building of God 1. So we find cloathed with Humility cloathed with Honour cloathed with Shame intended not as a Covering but as Transmutation of Us from one contrary to another as the Woman cloathed with the Sun her Divine Light instead of her Darkness Q. What of Christ may we put on and be cloathed with and wherewith to be cloathed upon 2. Not His Almightiness for that His Omnipotence is what no Creature can behold and reach so is the Brightness of his Fathers Glory upholding all things by the Word of his Power Nor the Body Soul and Spirit He received from the Virgin Mary That was Earthy a Soul Body and Spirit descending from Eve That being born of the flesh was flesh As such which he humbled himself to take he was the Son of Man and our Brother so also we put him not on As such he remains for That Humanity of Christ which he had from
improperly may be called an Immortal Death being a Death to the Glorious second Holy light Principle 3. The Soul is taken sometimes for the two first Principles I saw the Souls of them who had been slain c. for here the third Principle was asleep Sometimes it 's taken for the whole Man If thou wilt make thy Soul an Offering for Sin c. The Lord Jesus offered up all the three Principles meant here by his Soul and as was shadow'd by the whole burnt Sacrifice But in this Question Soul is restrained only to the first Principle because other Questions particularly reach the other two The above brief Answer may here suffice because Jacob Behmen so largely resolveth it in the Answer of the first of the Forty Questions of the Soul Q. 40. What is the Immortal Life in Man viz. the Soul and what is the outward Life in him A. 1. The Principle of Man's Immortal Life is what the Answer of the last foregoing Question renders it that is a Life sprung from the wrestling of the first four Forms of the first Principle They generate a strong stern eager sting prickle poison Life or bitter Root which as doth the Gall in living Bodies strikes up or enkindles Life 2. This being rooted in the Eternal Beginning or from the Eternal Abyss of the Father's Property can never find End or limit of Race But Either is according to the Fountain and Essence of its own Nature dark raging and fierce for ever or in the Holy Principle of Love in the Light World happy for ever 3. It must now be told what the outward Life of this World in Man is and must be sadly acknowledged to be Earthy and Sensual here is the Lust of the Eye the Lust of the Flesh and Pride of Life So that it may be said Shut the â—ive Windows that our House may be truly Light within 4. The Beasts live as Man doth having all the five Senses as he in some of them more sharp also some of them extend the Thread of their time to greater Measure are generally more exempt from Sickness wholly Privileged from careful Perturbations in good Measure without fear of future Events or Sorrow c. 5. So that Mans outward Life or third Principle as now it is from first to last renders him of all Creatures the most Miserable And his restless striving to satiate the Lusts of this Worlds Spirit by Wealth Greatness c. is an additional Sorrow and Vexation which some of the Ancients skilfully mitigated by wise Moderation and Contentation 6. Who sees not how much more grievous this Pilgrimage and Travel is to Man than to any other Creature Because his Creator made him for the Excellent Holy Sweet Paradisical Life Even as Hell is most intolerable to Evil Angels and lost Men who were created to be Inhabitants of Heaven whereas it is no Wo to those horrible Creatures that figure the fierceness of the Properties for that is their Life 7. Yet it is true the poor Brute Animals groan under the Curse Man subjected them to for they should have been harmless Figures of the Astral and Elementary Powers 8. To conclude the Answer of this Question let it be seriously considered That if Man will think to feed his Immortal Principle with Mortal Food viz. his Soul with this third Principle he doth as a cruel Murtheress who to still her unhappy Nurse-Child instead of Food amuses its Eyes with Objects and its Ears with Sounds and answers its hungry Laments with louder Noises till she hath forced it to sleep who so pines and destroys it 9. But the Love of God in Jesus Christ is the true real Food of the Soul it is true not like Shews and Sounds which are delusive also real and substantial not a Shadow which every thing here else is as to the Soul This Love as Food generateth its like in the Soul and strengthensit This Love as Physick Purgeth out all other Love and it reigneth and remaineth for ever Q. 41. What is the Idea or exact express reflex Image of God in Man wherein God worketh and dwelleth A. If a Volume were written to Answer this Question as well might be by reason of the Excellency and Importance of the Subject yet still it would be as under Locks and Seals from the fallen Adam until he enter into the Knowledge at the right Door of that he lost by his Fall 1. The Doctrine of the Resurrection was call'd Babling by the studious Athenians for Man is dead to the Holy Divine Image and in all who so abide the outward Astral Spirit and Elementary Body is the only Bridle of Suspension and Mitigation of the hellish Image or dark Principle 2. But had Man no more he were in no better state than the brute Beasts for in the Astral and Elementary they are in common with Man and in the dark Principle he is one with the Evil Angels 3. Yet so exceeding Great and Adorable was God's Grace Love and Pity that the same Grace was like a Seed inspoken into him at the Fall which in all by whom Obedience is yielded beareth Fruit to Eternal Life but it lyes as Dead in such who bury it under the Dominion of the Astral Spirit or that choak it under the Thorns of the Elementary Body 4. And all Impenitent Rejecters of God's regenerating Grace how subtle and studiously penetrating soever have no part nor lot in this Matter but are absolute Strangers guided by an unreasonable Model of Humane Reason resulting from the Information of the Sences twisted with the Maxims of Serpentine Wisdom 5. Nevertheless the Poor in Spirit that dyeth to its own Will and Lusts hath lively Characters of the Idea of the Divine Image and Birth for such a dying enters the Soul into the first Resurrection 6. God's Image is not in the Earthquakes of the first Principle nor in the Lightning and Thunders of the third Principle but most nearly in the small still voice of the Proclaiming his Gracious Merciful Long suffering Name for that is the second Holy Principle 7. And this speaking Almighty Word cannot be more than stammer'd by words no more than Omnipotence can be comprehended by Concrets With what Eye can a Sinner behold the unexpressible loveliness of That ravishing Face where dwells That Majesty which is the Express Image of the Father and before whom the Angels cover their Faces I must say when a drop of that Ocean of Love and Mercy blesseth my Soul I melt I stammer I am astonished Lord what is Man 8. God's exact Image consisteth of all the three Principles The first and third in perfect Order being thorowly illustrated by the second The mighty longing of the first like a Hunger produceth or begetteth the meek Will and glorious Majestick Principle of Light according to which God is called God And of the longing and will proceedeth the desiring which is a Love-spirit producing Millions and Miriads to Infinity of Variety
Progress as no other Creature had for of none of them was it said as of Man though not a few of them were ordain'd and still do propagate themselves otherwise than by distinct Male and Female as well in the Sensitive as in the Vegetative and Mineral Republick See the 54 Answer v. 1. and 43 Answer v. 3 4. 3. And the being not good may be noted from the Consequence of dividing the Tinctures that it succeeded as to an Army broken or a Besieged City one part Parling with the Enemy without Privity of the other concerning which the above quoted Answers speak much 4. Yet so propitious was Infinite Goodness and Wisdom at this Stand and Ebb of his Creature as to provide so suitable an Expedient not only that might prevent a worse state but which might also bring forth an Incomprehensible glorious Master-piece and Miracle of astonishing Love and Condescention the Lord Jesus Christ of and for whom are all things 5. Thus is it manifest how at first it was very Good after that how it was said it was not Good which may lead them that list to penetrate that when the End shall find the Beginning how the undivided Tinctures making the Virgin state shall be again and for ever very good as saith the Lord himself speaking of the Children of the Resurrection that they neither Marry c. but are in that respect as the Angels of God 6. Which state is amply signified that it should have been by the Lord 's recommending it to all to whom Power for it should be given also in that it was a Way traced out by his own Example pursued by our Apostle and others and Prophesied in the Revelations Q 62. Why caused God or did suffer a deep Sleep to fall upon Adam when he built a Wife out of his Rib What doth it mean A. 1. Sleep is a Perquisite or Appendix to Time a Foreigner to Eternity the result of a Conflict or Strife whereinto the vanquished retireth as doth the Matrix or watry Element when it is over-powred by the Fiery or Astral 2. And though Adam had not actually tasted the Fruit afterward forbidden yet had his Imagination penetrated into and his desire drawn forth the Tree on which followed the Severe or earnest Inhibition Then he as one overcome slept or swouned which the Divine Life in the Resurrection knoweth not 3 He slept to the Angelical World and awakened to the outward for Sleep is a respite or an arrest of the exercise of the Divine and Rational Faculties also as Death is to the Elementary outward Life 4. Not that it was imposed by Power without him from foreign Will and Necessity but was a necessary Supplement with reference to Adam himself which is the thing meant and taught us by this deep Sleep which God is said to have caused to fall on him Q. 63. How was the Wife or Woman made out of Adam What doth the Rib taken out of his Side signifie of which God made the Wife as Moses writeth A. 1. Moses saith God took one of Adam's Ribs out of his Side and thereof made a Woman Will any understand the Text so grosly as that his Bones were then as ours are dry dead rocky obnoxious to the penetration of Fire dissolution of Time c. Such a Thought is rather applicable to Bestiality than the Eternity 2. We are therefore to know the Rib whereof the Woman was made signified part of Adam's Strength for such were the Bones he then had and not such dead petrified weighty Substances as ours no more than his Flesh which was created for Eternity was like our Bestial Flesh at the Root of which is a Worm 3. And because Adam's Bone or Strength was a Composition of all his Essences Principles and Properties therefore it is rightly said a Rib or Bone and Substance nor is it any new Phrase to put one part for the whole the Scripture abounding in all parts of it with that manner of speaking 4. Also that it is said to be taken out of Adam's Side may signifie the procedure to be from the Noble and Central Part and into the Side literally did enter Longinus Spear when the Lord of Glory was Crucified 5. Eve was that Child which Adam should have gloriously produced which had he done Divinely Powerfully Actively Magically according to the excellency of his Creation-right it might have been call'd his doing it awake then also had that Child been as compleat as himself but being brought forth by an assisting Power and as to him passively and unknowingly may we be call'd his Sleep therefore less vigorous and perfect than his own Structure Thus the second Temple which was raised in an Eclipse of Times could not reach the excellent Fabrick of the first Temple 6. Yet forasmuch as Eve was brought forth though in some weakness yet with no offence to the Modesty and Virginity of the Divine Sophia of God's Wisdom therefore was she Holy though by the reason of her feebleness very near to a precipice of Danger Q. 64. Did Eve also receive a Soul and Spirit from Adam's Soul and Spirit or a nâ—â— strange one peculiarly or severally given of God A. 1. Had nothing been taken from Adam whereof to make Eve but a Rib and that had been such a Bone only as ours is come to be Eve's Production had not been from all Adam's Essences but such she was only Man hath most especially the â—irâ—â— Tincture and Woman most especially the Lights Tincture The Man more of the fâ—â—â—t or Soulâ— Principle the Woman more of the second or Spirits Principle 2. Thus Eve cannot be said to have a Soul and Spirit new and peculiarly from God but to partake with Adam of the same Soul and Spirit as may be proved as follows 3. To deny Eve part of Adam's Soul and Spirit because for her Structure the Text only mentions a Rib would with like force argue that she was not of his flesh 4. If Eve were not of one Soul and Spirit with Adam their Posterity must either every of them have new created Souls and so be unconcerned with their first Parents Transgression or uninclined to their immediate Parents Good or Evil habits The former of which opposeth Religion the latter Sence and Experience Or else the Children must have each two Souls and two Spirits one from each of their Parents which were a Solecism and morally a Contradiction by making two Eternities 5. If the Woman had another Soul and Spirit then that with Adam it must be out of other Principles but other Principles whence Soul and Spirit can be there are none for it were as absurd to make new Eternal Principles as to make new Gods 6. If the Soul and Spirit of Eve had not been one with and part of that of Adam's then the Lord Jesus who took a Soul from the Virgin Mary had not taken Man's or the Male Soul and so Men were not redeemed which is
8. Why the Temptation lasted forty days is referr'd to the 78 Answer Also why a God-Man should be Tempted is shewn above His Temptation must needs be of the Devil or otherwise as from without his Divinity and Purity exempting him from such variety as we poor miserable Creatures are surcharged with from within our Souls and outward Man and Objects of our Sences are as so many Snares Serpents and Devils in us about us and waiting way laying us 9. And lastly that all this must precede his working of Wonders and Miracles teaches us the method of the Eternal World also is manifest in all Created Existencies viz. That from the anguishes of the first four forms should result the glory of the second Principle or other three Properties But I close here because if God will that I live to meet with more of the dear precious golden inestimable Contemplation of the Process of Christ it may fall under the 117 Question Q. 113. How was Christ in Heaven and also on Earth both at once A. 1. Men may not think Heaven and this World to be so sever'd as that Heaven cannot be said to be here till the present World pass away for though this World cannot be in Heaven by reason of its Impurity yet Heaven is in this World for it comprehends it and is the whole second Principle where-ever the Infinite God is in his Love there is Heaven 2. This understood it must be acknowledged Heaven is in every Heart that loves God but every Child of God is not yet in Heaven for they are so present in the Body as that they are absent from the Lord that is their love c. hath an allay of Dross 3. But the Lord Jesus Christ and also the first Adam before his Fall were as Men or in their Humanity in Heaven for their love was perfect and it must be noted that the Lord saith not the Son of God but the Son of Man which is in Heaven I farther refer this Answer to the 77th and 108th Answers Q. 114. Why did Christ upon Earth teach before the People concerning the Kingdom of Heaven in Similitudes or Parables A. 1. We read All these things spake he to the multitude in Parables and without a Parable spake he not unto them 1. Adding that it might be fulfilled c. I will open my mouth in Parables seeing therefore the Text gives that for a Reason must we not receive it as such The second is The Reason the Lord Himself gives His Disciples To you it is given to know the Mysteries of the Kingdom but to them it is not given The Text also gives viz. with many other Parables c. as they were able to hear it The fourth is drawn from the Lord's warning and inhibition Cast not Pearls before Swine nor Holy things to Dogs of whom it is said by the Lord I speak to them c. because they seeing see not and hearing they hear not nor do they understand Of them also it is said Make the hearts of this People fat make their Eyes heavy c. 2. Summarily then the Children by means of their weakness were not able to hear it otherwise than in Parables though to them apart they were open'd and the Multitude by reason of their Wickedness were not worthy to hear it otherwise because the proud Rejecters of God were inwardly devilish and outwardly bruitish and are call'd Dogs and Swine to whom the Childrens Bread might not be given for God resisteth the Proud 3. Because Man was fallen into the third Principle over which he should have been Ruler so that the regenerate themselves were outwardly bruitish and in their inward and best part were as young Children to them the Gracious Lord vouchsafed to bow down and as it were lisp and to feed them with Milk 4. For as much now as Man was gone out of the Unity into the Multiplicity God of infinite Bowels follows him into it and there teacheth him by the Earth Corn Fruits Stones Thorns Sheep Fowls Ants c. Making them speak to him pursue convince and judge him by the Good and Obedience of the very Oxe and Ass gratefulness of the Earth for Rain and Bounty of Heaven in the Seasons and when nothing will do he makes the Stone cry out of the Wall and Beam out of the Timber to answer leaving such not only without excuse but accused by the whole Creation Nevertheless by these Parabolical Applications call'd the foolishness of Preaching was Power found to save them that Believe Q. 115. Why hath not Christ himself described his Gospel with Letters in Writing but only taught and left it afterwards to his Apostles to write down A. It may be supposed and argued who so sufficient as the Omnipotence of the Son of God Who could so exactly discover the Mysteries therein as the Author thereof Who could so challenge and command Belief as he who is Truth it self with the like reasonings 1. But we must know that the Three glorious Persons have Three distinct Operations viz. The Almighty Father or Infinite first Principle doth Eternally beget and generate as his Love Delight or Heart the Eternal Son whom he giveth The Almighty Son or Infinite second Principle is Eternally begotten every where in the Abyss giving Himself who is the Light of Divine Life having Life in Himself is Himself the Gospel written in the Heart Ye are manifestly declared to be the Epistle of Christ. The Almighty Spirit Holy Ghost or Infinite third Principle doth Eternally proceed from the Father and Son and Eternally publish propagate figure declare image and manifest the first Principle and the second also the first in the second infinitely through the whole Abyss 2. Thus was the carrying on publishing abroad or prospering this wonderful Work of the Arm of the Lord to restore lost Man being like making dry Bones live the proper operation of the third not of the second Person Therefore saith the Lord to the Disciples What I tell you in the ear preach you on the house tops Again He that believeth the works that I do shall he do and greater works c. And saith the Spirit when he cometh shall convince the World c. 3. Thus Abraham figured the Father's property or operation giving his Son a Sacrifice Isaac the Son's property giving himself but Jacob that of the Holy Ghost multiplying first into 12 Branches then became as the Stars and the Evil Seed only professing are like as the sand for multitude sand for their earthiness 4. Thus as the Lord saith the Father hath born witness of me And again speaking of the Holy Ghost saith for he shall take of mine and give it unto you not filling Jerusalem only but the whole World with his Doctrine Q. 116. Why must it be the very High Priests and Scribes or Scripture learned who taught the People that must speak against or
9. Here may be noted that never was Subjection Patience Humility and Obedience to Parents and all placed over us enforced by any so cogent and irrefragable Argument as it is by this Subjection of the Lord Jesus Christ to them Even to Joseph no otherwise His Parent than by Espousal to Mary and that not for a short time but a Tract of many Years even after His being among the Doctors about the Business of the Almighty Father 10. In admiration of this Condescention behold here Oh my Soul the only Son of the only God the Soveraign of all Worlds that He might pluck thee as a Firebrand out of the Fire of thine own kindling content to burn Himself that He might Redeem thee from dark Chains of Everlasting Vassalage became Himself a Servant subject to His Inferior Subjects because Man revolted from his Obedience to God God obediently subjected Himself to Man The Wisdom of God learnt Obedience by the things which he suffer'd 11. Doth my Soul beg to know His sweet Name Where dwells He and who or what is He like I am told He was like a Servant no Thing Creature or World may be liken'd to Him but that His dwelling is with the humble many times in old Cottages and strong Prisons And that one of His great Names is but a Monosyllable viz. LOVE 12. A Name that calls for Love and commands Obedience for the delight found in Love That Heart therefore that reading and meditating this and weeps not the heart that groans not bleeds not melts not breaks not flames not is not the Heart of a true Man but of a Beast or a Devil Metamorphos'd iâ—to Human shape 13. The third Mystery is of His Thirty Years privacy the Types of which are in the 110th Answer and in the first part of that Answer is the Ground why Thirty Years was the due proportion of time for compleating actual Righteousness 14. Else it may seem marvellous that He who was the Light of this and all Worlâ—s could with-hold any of His infinite diffusive Vertue Also that seeing He was only the saving Light and Fountain of Salvation without whom the World perisheth should conceal His Glory His Omnipotence not being obnoxious to the Conâ—agion of Sinners with whom He might converse which our impotence exposeth us to 15. May we not on this occasion be warn'd to put a strong bridle and restraint on our Tongues the Herald of our impetuous Lusts in our Applications to others knowing how often it wounds us and others and inverts the End for which it was vouchsafed us 17. May I not hence also convince my self that very much of my Work is within rather than abroad and that God's Holy Work with us is entirely within Men for the bestial part of us is the Monstrous Image got by departure from God so alienated that all Communications and Approaches to it must be Image-like if intelligible to us faln Men. 17. And whereas the Divine Work is agitated in Man's superior part it causeth a departure from the brutish Man therefore was this of our Lord 's most inwardly a Sacred silence privacy or secresie for so great a part of his Pilgrimage in Flesh on Earth wherein he was literally separate from Sinners 18. How cross to this is the precipitance of our rushing to speak our supposed Knowledge and of unmortified Mens hypocritical Stage-Plays in Pulpits and other publick Oratories 19. How opposite to this is our needless associating for Curiosity with Company to whom we cannot do and from whom we may not hope for Good 20. How diametrically thwart to this is that River of Thoughts like swarms of Locusts which are uncontroulably allow'd to consume our precious Fruit and these Thoughts are mostly generated in the stinking Lakes of discomposing converse with bestial people 21. Christ's sweating Blood in his Agony was when his Sufferings came to the breaking of the fourth Form which is the Fire for then did the other Forms severally grow prevalent surrounding him with Death that state being such as Men mean when they say the Heart is broken for in the Heart is the Fire-life All which did our dear Lord bear because Adam had enkindled in himself a Fire which had not Gracious Love even then interposed and been inspoken had soon devour'd him 22. The Lord was betray'd by Judas his pretended Friend and Servant for such seemed the Serpent to Eve and by a Kiss a fatal false Friendship of Eve to Adam thus we still fall by mistaking Enmity for Friendship perishing for want of Knowledge 23. Our Saviour was apprehended and bound for Adam our Undoer going out of the Liberty was bound by the prevailing Anguishes of the first Principle and Mortality of the third Principle 24. Jesus the Eternal Light was thus dealt with by Night because Adam went out of the Eternal Day into Eternal Darkness therefore was the Lord carried to the Murtherers by Night 25. Our King the Lord of Glory was mocked reproached derided and scorn'd by vile Men because Adam had introduced such odious shame as made him the scorn of the Devils 26. The Prince of our Peace was scourged though the Innocent Lamb of God for Adam awakening all the Properties made not only the Essences to be inwardly Raging but his outward Body as that of the Beast to be subjected to the Whip which the gracious Lord refus'd not to endure for us 27. The Son of God Heir of all Things and King of Immortality was Crown'd as if he had been a false King with Thorns because Adam would in his Pride be like God and wear this World's Crown 28. And as all these were but Fore-runners or Entrance of Adam on the borders of Everlasting Destruction whereinto he was plunging his whole Man and Posterity so all these things were done to the second Adam and meekly endur'd by Him before His Passion 29. And all this was to make a plain and terrible Demonstration to all Mankind that Sin unrepented of becomes a Substance crying for all inward and outward Vengeance for ever See 25 Chap. of the Three Principles Q. 118. Why must the very Teachers of the Law bring Christ to the Judgment and yet must be put to Death by the Heathenish Magistracy What doth that signifie A. 1. That so it was appears Now to answer why it was so Let it be noted that Persecutions proceed not out of the second Principle for in that all are United in Love and Meekness nor out of the third wherein Civil Magistracy standeth for that of its own Nature if not unwarily heated persecuteth none as is found in Christian Republicks who have no oppressive interest to advance or support Persecution introduceth not its sting 2. Nor in such only but in the Mahometan Monarchies is not Religion as such persecuted but Conquests made for the greatning their poor outward Momentary Power And this is found not only among the Turks but Persians under
Light of the second Principle there is generated in us the pure Love of the third Principle of which Love the Holy Ghost is the Author by this the Law is fulfilled and in and by it the Holy Ghost graciously seals the Regenerate to Eternal Salvation Who having been fed by the Flesh and Blood of the Lord Jesus have in part got his Heavenly Body on them which is attaining a measure of the Resurrection from the dead 6. This brings in Universality in the Room of Propriety one instead of many signified by the Tongues which tho' Cloven were all but one united and one only in every Language here see we the Kingdom on Earth as it is in Heaven and the new Man thus progressed is the true and in some sort perfect Image of the Trinity for it is the first disappeared Image which Adam fell from And in this most excellent way doth the glorious Trinity work in Eternity in all Divine Creatures wherein the Three Persons Image themselves Q. 148. What is the Litteral Word and the Living Word Christ in his shedding forth one with the other How became they distinguished seeing all did not hear the Holy Ghost teach from the Mouth of the Apostles for one sort of them said They are full of sweet Wine these heard indeed Mans Word but not Christ teaching in his Resurrection A. 1. The Literal Word did signifie in the Jewish Administration the Law of Circumcision c. call'd a killing Letter tho' even that were glorious as is intimated by Moses Face The Evangelizing by Preaching or Writing must then be much more glorious the Holy Writings of the Prophets Apostles and Saints are therefore exceeding precious and require great care and diligence to learn the Mysteries there intended and taught they are so good and important their Efficacy Majesty and End so Divine that the living Word and it are used as terms convertible but yet Metonymically As by the Cup is meant the Wine or by the Bag the Treasure 2. But the Living Word is the Eternal Creating Word and tho' no Language contains â—et every Word of Men is of it and by it and when the Lord Jesus saith of the Holy Spirit he shall take of mine and give it unto you he means the so speaking as the Spirit should give utterance Such was this when the God of Spirits fell on them other speaking sprung from Babel is as far below the Life and Power of that as the Consonants are below the Vowels which produce but muâ—e â—issings c. 3. And we may expect when God shall give to his one Heart one Soul one Love one Life of Faith Holiness Meekness Patience and Self-denial accounting nothing their own but as Members of the one Body to live as that white sweet first Age of those Guests at the Feast of Pentecost When God shall do this we may expect he will restore the Spirits of the Letters and give us Water at the pure Fountain until then as one people know not the Language of others so all people are strangers to this and as falshood causeth Men not to know others Minds by their Words so do Mens false Hearts make them unknown to themselves 4. Now why some of them who heard the Heavenly Tidings said these Men are full of sweet or new Wine was because themselves were Captivated in another Principle than that wherein the words were Born perhaps some in the deceits of the third Principle others in the wrath of the first so that they could no more comprehend the words of the Children of the day than the Creatures of the corrupt terrene Salitter can converse with the Aerial Creatures or the aquaâ—trish with those of the Fire or then we poor Offspring of faln Adam can skill the Dialect of Angels 5. Mans Heart is naturally prepossest against Divine Understanding and the simplicity of truth not only from his disorder'd Original but especially by Maturity of Growth to fixedness in the humane Apostacy for Youth stands in a true Ground which makes Angels delight in them until the Serpents Foxes and Goats their Tutors Companions and Tempters have gravely taught them to be Fools in Fashion also false and by degrees to be obscene and impudent of Conversation O how great is Mans Misery on Earth how innumerable his Snares how multiply'd his Perils and Sorrows in this great and terrible Wilderness How Infinite is the forbearance of a contemned Father How compassionate the Redeerner to his daily Murtherers How long-suffering is the grieved Holy Spirit O the Heighth and Depth and Length and Breadth of that Love so abused by us The subsequent Question excuseth saying more to this Q. 149. How doth Christ himself teach presentially in the Office of Preaching and yet sitteth at the Right Hand of God Or among whom doth Christ teach what is a Shepherd or Pastor in the Spirit of Christ and a Teacher of the Letter without the Spirit of Christ each in his Office A. 1. How Christ is in Heaven and every where on Earth at once according to his Heavenly Humanity the 119 Answer from ver 3. to the End sheweth Also it is elsewhere shew'd the sitting of Christ at the Right Hand of the Power of God is at the place where Love quencheth Wrath therefore are the Sheep at the great Day placed on the Right Hand of the Judge 2. But now to the next part of the Question among whom doth Christ teach it must be answer'd the Light which bringeth Salvation hath appeared to all Men for as every Countrey on Earth is visited by the splendor of the Sun and every Plant and Pile of Grass Influenced by him and so hath been from the Creation so also from Adam to the last Man hath Christ the only true Light shined and will shine 3. And as there are many places in some Countries and some Angles in every Countrey whereon the Suns Beams beat not directly yet is there no Vegetable which his Vigor Influenceth noâ— Such is the Pâ—eâ—ching Vertue of Christ to all present past and future 4. Again as every Mineral is not Gold nor every Fruit solar that the Suns veâ—tue should be totally prevalent in them but they all are helped the more to grow thereby in their own Property so that it is not the Suns fault that many are spoil'd Thus tho' Christ stands in the Door of every Mans Heart calls them waits the whole time of the Life of many and very long on all as a Judge as a Councellor and as a Monitor yet many grow hard and as evil Creatures the stronger in their own property by the desireable access of the Suns Rays Thus Impenitent Men do from Gods goodness treasure up wrath bless themselves say we shall have peace cry the Temple of the Lord c. and grow the more evil because God is most good and are the more daring the more they are intreated and strove with 5. Now to the latter part of the Question
so because the evil properties domineering in the Soul makes the Tincture false which in its self is true as also it is in the Devils 6. Thus we see the Air of its self sweet and wholesome in a City greatly infected with the Plague is by the Emanation of many Sick and Expiring Bodies by that contagion corrupt So the discord of the dark Soul invades the serenity of the Tincture and maims it of its Inclination and Ability to good and Invigorates it with the Rage of its own perverse Affections 7. Now to the humble obedient Child the Supper is a Feast giving nourishment suitable to his Hunger his Fire Soul and Principle of strength is meeken'd his drooping Spirit cheered his Astral Spirit composed into order some of the Properties restrained other properties stirred on and others sweetly encouraged and the disappeared Image of the Virgin by the Body and Blood of the second Adam restored 8. Come we now to the Doubt Whether the alter'd Ordinance retain power to do good It is answer'd That if the alter'd Administration fall short of shewing the End of its Institution or hath so great additions as so to cloud the thing signified as it cannot be rightly discerned or the change be such as doth race out the Ordinance its self the Essentials are departed and it is no more an Ordinance of Christ than a dead Corps is a Man the power disappears when the thing it self is not 9. It is true if the Soul remain so doth some measure of power as a Man may live yet have lost a Leg or Arm but dismembering is often Mortal to the Natural Body and not seldom so in lameing the Service of God carry such to the Ruler will he accept it But wo to such who innovate to them are the Curses of Gods Book added Also where Sacriledge is found it rends that Name out of Gods Book of Life and where the intire alteration is there Hell hath enlarg'd it self 10. Yet in every Age and Place where the Divine Love is or hath been begotten the Hunger is ever a receiver of such quantity of Manna as is according to every one's eating We see the outward Sun through Clouds Showers and ill Vapours in and under the Earth and Seas doth great good work and shall we streighten the unlimitable Divine Grace and Power Is the holy Child at any time driven into the Wilderness and goeth not God thither with him He that instructs us in Dreams in the Creation in evil Creatures and by many things evil as in themselves that brings good out of evil confirms us by our falls that brought Almonds out of Aaron's dry Rod shall not he also out of weakness create strength He doth out of the cruel Anguishes of the Lion-like first Principle bring the most sweet Honey of the holy second Principle Which is still a Riddle but the day of God dawneth and will proceed to a perfect day in all such in whom he of whom Samson was a shadow shall slay the enmity of the four dark forms by introducing Divine Light and the holy Power World Q. 159. What do the Learned when they reproach one the other about Christs Testaments and the precious Covenant of Grace And disgrace one another and give up one another to the Devil about it Whether do they also manage the Office of Christ whether is that right or wrong whether also is this done as a Minister of Christ Or whom do they serve thereby A. 1. Their reproaching each other usually proceeds either from outward prosperity or desire of Superiority whence come Wars come they not from your Lusts which War in your Members When Joseph had open'd to his Brethren a prospect of approaching prosperity he seasonably warn'd them not to fall out by the way As soon as Constantine had given the Christians a general Jubilee from the frequent Persecutions of more than two hundred years up riseth Arrius and other Hereticks Titular Christians persecuting the real Christians As saith the Apostle He that was after the Flesh Ishmael persecuted him that was after the Spirit for which there are many Reasons briefly thus 2. The counter Christian being shut up in the first four forms of Nature to stifle his intestine tumults sallies out into the third Principle which is the great figure of his proper radical disorders the World therefore being his only home he will be Master there especially over them who both are and own themselves to be strangers 3. But God keeps peace among his Children by his Rod which is so Moral an Argument of conserving peace that the penitent Thief urg'd it on the other viz. Dost thou not fear God seeing thou art under the same condemnation On the swelling of Severn by a great Flood Islands were made on some of them Lambs and Foxes saved themselves where the very Foxes tho' hungry were observed to keep a Civil Community with the Lambs being all under one Consternation 4. Mans departure from the Unity into the Multiplicity brings his Lifes forms into Enmity But Heavenly Peace the Sister of Sacred Love is Born at the reducing him from the Multiplicity into the Unity again 5. If therefore the love of the World and the things of the World viz. as it is figur'd and impressed by the evil dark Powers be the cause of strife introducing the contrariety and multiplicity Then the Love of the Heavenly Father whence we departed being regenerated in us by his only Son in the method of Self-abasing which is the Cross of the Christian as far as he is unmortified This love thus begotten makes peace and this appeased mind which also was in the Lord Jesus Christ divides the World into two parts only viz. the humble afflicted Children of Sacred Love those of the day and the proud unmortified Workers of evil in the Kingdom of Darkness Whereby it is that the renewed Image hath only Enmity for its Enemy Q. 160. Which is the very mark of a right Christian upon Earth whereby Men may distinguish him from a Titulary Christian Here begins the Ninth Grand Distribution A. In the 154 Answer is much to the opening of this 1. The Christian in Heart and Life is very precious and as secret as precious Thus precious Metals are the most secret being resembled by baser so precious Stones have their counterfeits and Nature is much of it imitated by Art even as the out-issued or out flown Nature of this World is but a Figure of the two Eternal Worlds all therefore-to be seen here are not the things themselves but Shadows Figures and Representations and those but as in a Glass darkly 2. What wonder then that the Christian is unknown to others and to himself also in great measure when Paul saith of himself lest while I Preach to others I my self be a Cast-away The new Man is not very apparent to him in whom he is when yet is at a good growth and sometimes wholly obscur'd for the Astral Man
seen in raging furious desperate men from thenceforth wanting a Mouth capable to eat Paradisical Food therefore God cursed the Earth that it also should no more be able to produce nor be intrusted with Living Holy Fruits of the Heavenly Power-World for the Heavenly Humanity once withdrawn Man was no longer a Subject Member Citizen or Child of God's Kingdom but a Beast and in the Bestial Astral and Elementary Kingdom at Enmity with the Holy Pure Sweet Eternal Order 5. Therefore Christ taketh the Kingdom by bringing again the holy disappeared Power-World or Heavenly Humanity into the captivated dark debilitated Humanity call'd an Ingrafted Word also a Seed growing to a Tree A Leven levening the whole A Refiner and is as a sparkle enkindling the whole and as in germination of a Seed the gross matter given it from the Elements dieth or as of the burnt Sacrifice the Elementary part is by the fire of the Altar separated into a Vapour and Salt Just so Christ entred the corrupted Man and leading it through Death became the true Separator He brought the holy Virgin Image the alone Heavenly Virginity which is signified by the Salt thrown by Elisha to heal the Fountain not only the Stream For This Divine Power healeth the Tincture and the Tincture being cured like the healed Spring by its new got Magical Might and Puissance is a Co-worker with God in regenerating the whole Man As the Subterranean Fire doth draw one way with the Solar Fire in propagating and advancing the Generation of Metals ejection of Fountains and sanative hot Baths 6. This Kingdom is not taken but purchased by the Blood of the King of it and what this Blood was see the 124 Answer 2 6 8 and 9 verses but this Kingdom is such that it is the scope of all the Writings of the holy Ones from Adam the first Man to the unknown day and hour of the end of this dying World Men who would fain be Atheists have said the great ingredient of their mortal fatal contagious Madness hath been the observing how little affected the Conversations of such shew them to be who profess the knowledge love and fear of an Infinite Powerful Omniscient and Omnipresent Glorious and Gracious Father Son and Holy Ghost thinking they could not so converse did they indeed believe what themselves say 7. But the reason thereof hath been the deceiving Spirit for there hath all along been such Sacrificers as Cain such as have the Faith of Simon Magus the Prophesyings of Balaam the Humility of Ahab the Repentance of Judas the Abstinence of the Foolish Virgins the priviledge of the Tares to be the Guest without a Wedding Garment the Branch yet wither'd and cut off the Wife but Divorced the Building without Foundation those who after cleansing take seven worse Spirits whose goodness is like the Morning Dew Stars but either fallen or wandering ones Teachers but yet at last Cast-aways All these professing themselves of Christs are really of the Devils Kingdom 8. For that which these attain is at highest but Faith as it is an act of the understanding which gives a false faint Light without Life and Heat while the Faithful Subjects are actuated and moved by a Faith that purifieth the Heart and subjecteth the Will proceeding from strength to strength for as purifying Faith worketh from Love so it increaseth Love Simplicity and Innocency and there is founded the Kingdom of Patience It is true Mahometans the dark Ethnicks and Barbarians call those things Vices and those Vertues which we call so and by that Rule They accuse or excuse themselves or others But the Doctrine of our Lord Jesus Christ the Son of God not only condemns our evil but tenders us Life Eternal it kills us to save us that is it sends us out of our selves by resignation of our separate perverse will that we may be regenerated unto the holy universal comprehensive will Whereby is obtain'd and convey'd not only self-abasing but purging and saving Mercy of Free Grace as only of meer Alms from God This Grace proceeding from pure pity and undeserved goodness is of all things in the World the most disagreeable to Mans unmortified proud Heart most cross to his own will therefore the most sublimely divinely true 9. Faln Mans dejecting himself may be call'd Humiliation Anguish and a Spirit of Bondage but the top of this is but uncloathing the Man who is thereby neither wash'd nor cleansed but the Conscience still polluted the proud Devils must yet see their own deformity with Anguish thus this Spirit in Man shuts him up in the first four Forms or Properties But it is the Spirit of God by the Faith of the Gospel which is generated in the fifth growing to a Flame of Love by the Holy Blood of the true second Adam only washeth the Soul and sprinkleth the Conscience from dead Works How miserable then must those Men be who are willingly ignorant of the power and infinite value of Christs Heavenly Blood and yet themselves undervaluing it are pretended Perfectists yet declare so great an aversion to this as if they would know nothing of that which the Apostle Paul desir'd only to know Contemning the inquiry into that Mystery which the Angels desire to look into But to help the sincere Mind towards the Understanding of the Heavenly condescention in the Lords Incarnation the reperusal of the 106 Answer is seriously recommended And what kind of Subjects Christ taketh into his Kingdom are Character'd in the 117 Answer from ver 3. to the 8th And what the inestimable Blood of this Lamb of God is see the 77th Answer ver 7 8 and 9. The Kingdom is taken by the Glorious King of it without hands As the Angel saith of the Stone to Daniel even as the outward Sun conveys not his Light and enlivening Heat by the violence of stormy Winds but is calmly and sweetly his own Vehicle under whose glorious dear Sway and Scepter may the Lord bring our whole Man and every part of it for ever that this which is the Kingdom of Gods patience may be that of his Power concerning things pertaining to this Kingdom the Lord discoursed with his Disciples in the forty days after his Resurrection But yet this Kingdom suffereth violence tho' it doth none and the violent take it by force for it requires that all diligence be used that Men work out their Salvation with fear and trembling that they ask seek knock search dig watch fight strive wrestle suffer wait comparatively hate Father Mother Wife Child and our own Life Pray without ceasing looking to Jesus c. for as the King entred by the Cross so must the Subjects Q. 166. What is the true new Regeneration in the Spirit of Christ Is it done in this time or after this time A. 1. Here is a question consisting of two parts 1. What the true new Regeneration is 2. What time is it wrought in Both of them are secrets the first done by
hast had something in thee to stout it out against the Charâ—s of Divine Love God glorifies his Almightiness Wisdom and Goodness in Evil Creatures his Justice by the Devils so that if we be wicked what loseth he and if we be righteous is it not for our selves On the 22th Question and Answer Why must there be Strife in Nature 1. By Nature is meant the Outward Nature where strife ariseth out of contrariety and contrariety founded in the dividing of the Properties which dividing should have been hidden from Adam had he continued in the Harmony but his Fall opened the Enmity in his Soul in his Spirit in his Astral Man and in his Body which then was bâ—coâ—e Bestial And the Peace Man composeth is the consequence of ignorance or stupâ—dity which our Saviour when he comes breaks and draws a Sword against 2. The reason is because the Peace of our making is a stifling or violent stopping of the Natural Issues of the Striving Properties no more like the true Rest than Adam's Sleep was like the Paradisical Life but the Lord's Rest and Peace is when the six working Properties result in the seventh and the four Forms generate the fifth yet neither the sixth nor the fourth cease to be or to work but in their working attain the true end of their work 3. Is it thus O my Soul beware of indulging drowning and burying thy self in stupid ease but as the Infinite Father worketh hitherto generating the Son and the Son worketh in the Father and the Holy Ghost goeth out continually with Power and Vertue so also in thy very little wretched poor faculties co-operate with highest longing and desire in this happy strife bring the strong Forms of thy first Principle into the meek Light of thy second and let all issue into Divine Love and Delight which will be a third till thou flame and thou be as fuel dying and rising again always more bright and flaming Fear not to die daily but study press pray and practise it that thou maist every day be renewed and transformed into the Image of him a glance of whose gracious countenance hath a ravishing Power and covers thee with shame and confusion and yet with excess of humble trembling Joy it shakes yet confirms it kills yet revives And if a glance be so noble and powerful what were a steddy look and then what losest thou straying into outward divertisements those deluding flatterers Lookest thou on any thing without a design to see thy great Lord in it it renders thee loss of time bows thee down like the Beast is thy snare and thou dost unnaturally lay hands on thy self be thine own deceiver making thy sences thy tempters lest there should be want of Devils but to strive against this is a Holy War Art thou my Soul unwilling pray the Divine Will may make thee an imprest Souldier Faintest thou Love hath Eagles wings Fearest thou Faith hath a whole Armoury Thinkest thou this Combate is above Thee to atchieve what were all the Spirits of the Just made perfect but the Children of sinners and themselves sinners pluckt out of the Fire Captives redeemed by our Lord Jesus Look on that Eye my Soul who ever looks on thee and all days will be holy days all places holy places and thou ever in the best company thou art capable of such as will teach thee to lead thy natural strife into supernatural triumph On the 23th Question and Answer On the Dividing the One Element into four 1. Like as the Monuments of former Ages the Tower of Babel the Egyptian Pyramids the undertakings of Archimedes c. do commemorate the Archievements and Skill of the Framers so do the works of God speak the great Jebovab Whence the Psalmist The Heavens declare the glory of God and the Elements shew his handy-work The four Elements are according to the four Forms 2. Behold how out of one are all things infinitely proceeded for out of the Unity is breathed the multiplicity so that when we bring our multiplicity forward as we ought we return into the Unity O my Soul let the multiplicity of the very Out-birth of the third Principle be but taught to know its distance and thou maist live in the Unity rule over the Multiplicity and bring out of the four Elements their Glory and Vertue for the praise of the Almighty Soveraign that in an outward way yet having Eyes within they like the four Beasts before the Throne without ceasâ—â—g say Holy holy holy c. And again when thou diest to the Tyranny of the four Forms of thy Root thou ascendest by their Harmony into the several branches bearing good fruit 3. What tho' thy Sting be sharp may it but stir thee up the more vigorously to the work of God in thee What tho' thy Fire be hot may it be the incentive to a radiant Love-flame What if thy Anguish be greatly ponderous and oppressive if it ballance steddy and fix thee to a glorious perseverance Courage then thou art on a short Voyage to a vast Country Are not all the Elements doing their several Offices Is not every Pile of Grass obeying its Ordinance and levelling at the End of its Institution Is not the whole Faâ—ily of the very innocent Creatures preparing themselves to live and die for thy pleasure profit and necessity And wilt thou not do and suffer for him whose thou art and who hath vouchsafed to make himself of meer Grace to be thine and which conformity in thee is for thine own absolutely necessary overflowing Eternal superabundant Advantage thou hast but these three things make thy choice either to go back into Egypt stand still and fall in the Wilderness or go on after thy Captain into the Land flowing with Milk and Honey On the 24th Question and Answer Wherefore and to what Benefit are Stars Created The Stars are the Revelation or Immense palpable finite dissolvible Body of the Infinite Eternal Holy Substantial World and that 1. In their Splendor especially in the glorious shining Sun But how dirty and vile is Man O my Soul how art thou darkened every little Storm clothes thee in Rags and casts filth on those Rags every recess of true Light leaveâ— thee languishing as one Foot were in the Grave whilst their Beauties are in their Principle lifted far above such mutations fix then thine Eye on thy Sun and like the Flower of the Sun turn ever to him and only to him wherein alone lyes thy chief good 2. In their variety wherein they are admirable particularly in the seven Royal ones So are there in Saturn Mars Mercury and Jupiter when cross aspected an intolerable ligation anguish rage and proud elevation in the Sun Moon and Venus a scorching Fire Inconstancy and Impurity in all which the Eternal dark Principle openeth it self but in their benevolent Aspect is an Harmonious Noble Transcendent Excellency figuring the Paradisical Holy Principle But how much in thee O my Soul is there not
Let me Oh thou God of my Spirit neither begin much less end with the outside washing which is my self washing of my self But let my Soul my Inside my Heart Will Designs Desires and my secret Thoughts be washt by thee for without that I have no part in thee Let this washing last longer than the possibility of my polluting my self can endure and let me be washt from my self which is the foulest sink on this side Hell Then and not till then shall I know what the Water above the Firmament is and can do for such a black Creature who of himself must cry unclean unclean On the 27th Question and Answer Of the Male and Female Kinds Whence is their Desire to each other And of the necessity of it 1. We are taught to pray Thy will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven But seeing that Man hath now by dividing the Tinctures who till then Imaged the Divine Kingdom got such a will as is on Earth among the Brute Beasts losing the Heavenly Image what remains but that the will be taught subjection and long for groan after earnestly desire and accordingly pray to be restored here to be as they are in Heaven where by the reunion of the Tinctures they Image their God Yet tho' the Rent of the Tinctures be irreparable in the bulk of Mankind here and that God of pity to his Creatures hath extracted Good out of Evil bearing by Divine Patience that in Man whereof Nature it self as deprav'd as it is shameth at It nevertheless remains our Souls Work and Duty to learn what his dear disappear'd Virgin Image is studiously and sollicitously to seek that his first Love the Free Woman the Jerusalem from above which withdrew when Adam slept bitterly to bemoâ—n that loss and account the finding that precious Pearl worthy of all pains care and highest diligence and having found it then to sell all to buy it 2. But now my Soul seeing thou art so Beastly in thy Earthy Elementary and Astral part infecting thy noble Eternal part behold with abhorrence thy filthiness by a true impartial Glass Where is the Modesty of a Virgin state which doth the will of God in Heaven That purity which descended from Heaven and when Men became degenerate returned thither Why hast thou suffered the Virgin to wait at thy Door and Window calling as to her Bridegroom Exciting sometimes a Transport of Love other times shame again Joy to Trembling or Grief to Astonishment Finding thy self in so strange a Lodging as was Nebuchadnezzar when a Beasts Heart was given him If thou compare thy self with thy self in some days past perhaps thou maist flatter thy Judgment into Partiality and if thou compare thy self with others seeming more filthy thou maist be apt to pride thy self but if thou reflect on thy pollutions and the pure holy Virgin how great will be thy monstrosity how wretched vile and naked Come therefore daily to this perfect Standard just Balance true Glass and bewail thy defection bear the shame of thy deformity be humbled to the Dust as great Malefactors and miserable Captives whom nothing but Death can set free and redeem are dejected 3. And will nothing till Death intirely free me O my God and that my Soul hath no share of the natural Death which could it taste would only reprieve not deliver Let therefore that Death of Death the Mysterious Death of the Cross which opens the Door to the first Resurrection be powerfully vouchsafed so shall I be saved from this Mother of Harlots and Abominations of the Earth and my Heart and Mouth be fill'd with thy pure praises for ever On the 28th Question and Answer Of the Principles of the Spirit of this World 1. The Psalmist meditating the frame of his Body saith it is fearful and wonderful The Fabrick of the whole Creation must needs be so likewise for 't is a Mirrour shewing evidently and distinctly all Worlds Powers and Properties not as a dead record but in a living Image by an Articulate voice with as many demonstrations and Tongues as here are forms All convincing that Man of great stupidity who sees not God hears not his voice reads not Lectures of his Infinite Wisdom Power and Goodness in this his Theatre The day is the Child of the second Principle the Night derives its Fountain from the first time is not fatherless the Principles of the Spirit of this World being various such must needs the Creatures be 2. It went with Man as with one drunk regardless of the top of the Stairs missing the first falls down all the rest or as one sleeping on the Brow of a Precipice or brink of a River whence if he tumbles it is to the bottom thus he who should have had Dominion over the Astral Powers losing the Reins is not only hurried by them but subjected to the Extremities of the Elements and domineer'd overby the sickly Humours Wants and Excesses of the Bestial Flesh and corrupting uncleanness of this Bag of Worms 3. If thou my Soul delightest in this 't is as a Fool in throwing Darts art thou proud of thy Bodies features as well may an unsound Man of his Ulcers or a Vassal of his Shackles thus to be present in the Body is to be absent from the Lord whose gracious presence removed makes Hell Return then Oh my Soul my Spirit and my Inward Powers into your rest live in the incombustâ—ble Body put on the Humility Modesty and Sacred Flaming Love being the Heavenly Flesh of Jesus Christ then will this Worlds Spirit own Subjection no longer be a Clog or Lord but a Staff and Servant To this O thou Almighty Arm strengthen me O thou Glorious Sun inlighten me O thou Sacred Breath enliven me for without thee what can I do who am faln to be weakness darkness and dead under this outward Worlds Tyranny On the 29th Question and Answer Of the Sperm or Seed of the Generation of all things 1. The Psalmist complains I was shapen in iniquity and in sin did my Mother conceive me but the Sperm or Seed of all things is without iniquity standing in the fifth form of Fire being in its Existence a Mirror wherein the Abyssal Will beholdeth it self and in its operation a transition unto or imager of the Multiplicity 2. But how much doth Man who was created Good by seeking out many Inventions run against the order of Nature for out of the dark Earth sprout excellent Vegetatives with various cheering Odours delightful Colours and â—asts and nourishing Vertues out of the Mortal Waters are generated vast numbers and kinds of Fish also Amber Pearl Coral c. all more excellent than the Water their Mother which is corrupt as is the Earth Yet Man tho' proceeding from an Immaculate Sperm or Virgin Seed originally is become vile and filthy moving retrograde and is more and more degenerate earthy sensual and devilish 3. Wert thou O my Soul the Image of thy God how wouldst thou
Miâ—d not enlightened by Divine Light reach them for like must be comprehended by like And tho' Heavenly Treasure be carried in an Earthy Vessel yet there must be a Heavenly Receptacle hid in the Earthy or the Heavenly cannot be comprised 13. Eternal Life is in a Twofold Source First That of the Originality viz. the fierceness according to which God calls himself a consuming Fire and this Principle we must have or else we should not be alive Yet if we stay in this without generating the Love and Humility our abode is in Pride Covetousness Envy and Anguish as the Devils 14. Let us look to it that seeing the Life in the Originality is both Inimicitious against it self and against the Regeneration and that the Life in the Love is Heavenly therefore we be content to be pierced wounded and to bear the Cross in Meekness and expect till at the day of Separation the Field of the first Principle in which groweth the Heavenly Fruit of the second Principle shall be taken away for then shall the Life springing up through Death be a Fruit to God in the new Man and thereunto dedicate our selves in our Meek Victorious Saviour THE THIRD BOOK OF Jacob Behmen CALLED THE Threefold Life in Man CHAP. I. Of the Root Beginning and Forms of Life 1. SEeing there is in us an incorruptible Life wherein is a Principle capable of the highest good yet by its Original is also in danger of Eternal Perdition and Misery and that here we are strangers posting away how necessary is it to search whence all these originate And this may be by going up the Stream to the Fountain 2. The outward Elementary Life is a Living Heat or Active Fire enlivening the Body and sustained by the Body the Body by the Food the Food by the Earth the Earth by the Water and the other Elements the Elements by the Fire of the Constellations their Fire inkindled by the Sun causing a Boiling in all So should that first outward cause cease the sude or seething and Generation of all also of Metals Fruits c. would cease as the Food failing the Body and its Life extinguisheth 3. Now this perishing Life hungering after a higher Life shews there is such and that is the Eternal Life of the Soul As is said in Moses God breathed into Man the Breath of Life and Man became a Living Soul The Soul is also an ever induring Fire and must have Food which it presseth after from its original which is the Eternal Band the Forms of the Eternal Nature the Property of the Father but that Band of those Forms is of it self as a dry Breast whence it is that the Soul would have the Food in its own power but that also is as impossible as for the Eternal Nature to have the Light in its own power which cannot be for the Love shining in it or into it remaineth Lord therein because the Eternal Nature doth not comprehend it but rejoiceth in the Light which is another Principle which when it is received into the Soul it is a new Birth ingenerated in the Soul and this is done as truely as the Soul like a Branch is come from the Tree of the immediate Parent 4. And because Adam fell into the Astral Kingdom and our Elementary Body is infected therewith as sometimes the Body is with the Pestilence it was out of the power of the Soul to enter into the Divine Principle therefore of meer Infinite Grace did the Love the Son of God take our Humane Soul and brought it into the holy Life that we might every one by or for our particular selves press with our Soul in the Life of Christ into the new Regeneration in the Spirit of Christ. No Meritorious Works on the one hand or lifeless feigned words of believing on the other avail at all but only a stedfast earnest resolution in the new Created Will bearing the Cross killing the old Will and arising in the Life of Christ bringeth the Glory Food and Paradise of the Soul else the Soul remains in the four Anguishes or Forms of the Eternal Band for ever wherein stands the Eternal Wrath and Hell Fire for ever And thus see we the Original in the first Principle and the Divine Light making the second Principle why then should not the Man to whom this Knowledge is graciously given speak of this as his Native Countrey not as of things afar off but that wherein he standeth and himself really is and not to be learnt of another Man as is barely an History unless himself enter into the new Birth in the Life of Christ that the Divine Light may shine in him 5. The Root whence is inkindled the Vital Fire consists of two Forms only the sour which is a strong shutting up and the bitter sting is an opener and those are what the Eternal Will in the desiring attracteth and is the wills something and darkness Then the sting of the bitterness would get loose which the sourness captivateth with strife tho' like a wâ—e is yet no pain for they are immaterial forms of Nature in the Eternal Will and this contrary commixture is as a confusion of Eternal Mobility and cause of the Multiplicity of Essences and are efficiently the Eternal Essences and Eternal Band. 6. The vast infinite space desireth narrowness or comprehension wherein to manifest it self as a Map doth in a few Inches a huge Territory a short Speech or Scene Abridge a large History a Minute Model Epitomize the Terrestrial and Celestial Orbs. And as all pourtraying Figures have shadows as foils to set off the rest so in the contraction of matter to manifest Infinity must be Darkness that one contrary may illustrate the other Nor is the vast infinite space a Creator but a Genitrix and the Word in with and of the Father the Generator as the Territory makes not of it self the Map also the words owe themselves to the speaker or speaking word 7. Nor is the word departed nor doth the Son depart from the Father but is inseparable as the Light of a Candle abideth with the Candle as saith the Son I am not alone but the Father is with me in the Father is a Centre in the Son is a Centre two Principles not divisible but inseparable Thus the second Will opening the Principle of Light is amiable pure and mild also Omnipotent to Create all things breaking and shining out of the Eternal Essences yet not comprehended by them but dwelling in it self CHAP. II. Of the Begun Life the Principles and Forms and Fall 1. THE stirring in every Life whether Sensitive or Vegetative must not be a strange or Heterogene Power for such would blow it out rather than help it but it must be the Creatures own Spirit proceeding in the Genitrix to be a Centre and Circle also of Life None should trust their Soulâ— with the Men whose Home is here for the Soul stands in the Original of the Essence of all
they were both yet in the Garden of Eden and in Paradise Adam's desire had imprinted it self into the Magical Image as a Mother doth on a Child in her Womb therefore the Woman had Earthy Lust so soon As to this day most of that Sex coming to any years selfish Will or Lust is predominant appearing inglittering Pride contrary to Virgin Modesty Chastity and Humility 2. The Devil then in the Serpent laid himself on the Tree of Temptation for the Serpent was more subtle than all the Beasts of the Field because Lucifer falling from his Divine Hierarchy and infecting the Essence of the expressed word in the Fiat according to the dark Worlds Property his desire drew the thorny subtilty out of the Centre of Nature which as to one part was the Serpents Ens. 3. Tho also in the Serpent is found by the wise excellent Art and Vertue for the Devils Poyson being taken out there is Divine Power in a fiery hunger in him As is also in the Earth where may be found the Arcanum of the World 4. The Devil by the Serpent insinuated to Eve as if God had with-held some great thing from them and that if she would eat she should as God know good and evil which was true For the Essences of that Tree were Discordant but said not that Heat and Cold Sickness and Death would force into her But that by the Serpen's eating thereof he had attained so great prudence 5. Eve liked well to be a Goddess and so fell from the Divine Harmony from the resignation in God and united with the Devils Desire 6. Then the Holy Spirit departed and the Heavenly Limus in the Flesh disappeared or died As the extinguishing a Candle which enlightened a dark Room 7. VVhile Man stood resigned in God all the Properties were in Harmony equal weight and measure as time is in Eternity or in God But when Man 's own will began effectually to work the whole Magical Astrum wrought also contrariety and enmity in the outward Astrum and four Elements 8. The Properties of all good and evil Beasts did awake and become domineering in him yea of a Fox Bear Wolf Lion Dog Bull Cock Cat Horse Toad and Serpent Also that Astrum which is most predominant at the time of Conception hath its desire in the Seed and also Figures the outward Person and the poor Soul becomes Married to such a Beast unless a Man be Born anew forsake this Bestial Property and come as a Child into the Kingdom of God pointed at by Circumcision and Baptism 9. How great was that Horror and Anguish now in Man When in Astonishment they crept behind the Trees in the Garden from the dread of Gods awakened Anger making their Love fire tremble on Knowledge of their new-gotten Bestial Properties Even so did the Limus of the Earth whence Adam's outward Essence was extracted tremble and shake when the Lord Jesus on the Cross with his great Love in his Heavenly Blood did overcome Gods Anger which was effectually working in it CHAP. XXI Of the Impression and Original of the Bestial Man and beginning of Sickness and Mortality 1. THAT only which stands in the Temperature hath no Destroyer but subsisteth Eternally for opposite Essences weaken and destroy each other Yet if the captive Essence of the Heavenly Property may be redeemed from the curse and wrath of Nature it comes into the Temperature and awakens the Heavenly Worlds Essence in a living Body if such there be in that Body and expelleth evil 2. So great a sway the outward Beastly Man hath over the hidden inward heavenly Man that it holds it as Gold shut up in the gross Oar unable to shew itself but lyes as dead it must therefore be Born anew and fed with the second Principle or remain ever uncapable of the Kingdom of God It must re-obtain Divine Essence and die to the Beast and Regeneration to its first Estate is brought to pass in Christ. 3. The Scope of this Author is 1. To search out the Image of God 1. How it was Created 2. How Corrupted 3. How it shall be restored 2. What is the New birth out of Christ. 1. What is the Inward and Immortal Man 2. What the Outward and Mortal That being known how it was corrupted it may come again into its first Estate CHAP. XXII Of the Original of Actual Sin c. 1. EVery word of Man proceeds from an Eternal Ens either of Love or Anger A word conceived becometh substance when 't is sounded and then must have a place of Rest either in its like in another or it will return to its Mother the Fountain or Mind whence it is 2. Doth a wicked Man Curse Eccho a word of Love against him let not his Curse enter infect and take Root but will return and heap Coals of Fire on the Reviler for the enkindled Spirit layeth hold of the Inventers very outward Body 3. Sin at first and ever since is Born of a strange Ens when the will leaving the pure simplicity in which it was Created entreth into the Serpents Craft and Poison But tho' the will to good may have evil adhere to it yet if it hath not consented to the evil but rejects it that the sinful desire cannot come into Essence that good will hath not hereby wrought evil but the holy Word judgeth the false 4. The Serpents Ens was a Virgin of Heavenly Beauty but Lucifer introduced thereinto the dark Worlds Property yet hath the Serpent according to the right of Eternity both Tinctures The Pearl is in it but hidden because of the Worlds false Magick that the holy Virgin Ens might not be introduced into an ungodly Serpentine one It were good the Artist knew this 5. The Children of God are the Temple of the Holy Ghost who dwelleth in them without this there is no true knowing or will but strife by the Craft of the Serpent about confused verbal wranglings as did the Jews carry Moses words in their Mouths but mixed them with the crafty Serpents Ens and so it must be still that the word in Gods Children may be stirr'd and whetted and the Truth struggle to the Light Therefore must the Body die it cannot Inherit the Kingdom See more of the Original of Sin in this Book of Extracts of Aurora and in the sixth Chapter of the Book of Predestination And mentioned also in the 15th of the Forty Questions CHAP. XXIII How God recalled Adam and his Eve and ordained the Saviour 1. AFter Adam and Eve had eaten of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil seeing their gross bestial flesh hard bones and deformed Worms carkass shewed it self in their tender delicate body their shame drove them behind the Trees for God's rebuke awaked in them as it had done in Lucifer and they as revolted Rebels were in great shame before God and all the holy Angels and scorn'd by the Devils Into this shame and scorn did Christ enter which caus'd the
Sperm or Seed to their maturity and declining who all by the due temper violent extream or fading of This Spirit have the proportion of increase or declination to Nullity for This as a Weather glass or Index shews their degrees of vigour or languishing 4. But let it suffice no longer to hold a Candle to the Sun which in conjunction with Mars is in the out-birth the great instrument which doth abundantly demonstrate and figure This 4th Spirit and on the 4th day was the Sun created or enkindled The 4 first Spirits thus distinctly known open us among many others the Scriptures following 5. This is the Condemnation that light c. and men love darkness c. because their deeds are evil that is they are comprised in the first four forms refusing to be enkindled by the light of the 5th form but remain by the Astringency immeasurably covetous by the attraction uncontroleably proud by the property of the anguish repleat and swoln with envy and by That of the fire have fierce furious anger Our lusts warring in our Members the cause of Wars which remain such till the light of God or second Principle enkindles it and so compose Peace Man is become like the Beast that Perisheth Like the Wolf and Swine by the astringent covetousness The Lion Horse Cock by the proud elevating attracting will Like the Toad Torpedo c. by the anguish Like Dogs Tigers c. by the furious fiery property Thus the Soul like the Traveller fell among Thieves where he perisheth till the good Samaritan takes pity 6. In these 4 Adam was dead till God inspoke the Word promising life the way of reviving is by enkindling light and in the light the Divine Love clearly typified by the Law of Sacrifices for as the Sacrifice gave it self up in a flame as of love to ascend leaving only its ashes which were His till then Impediments so is this Indignation and wrath tribulation and anguish on every Soul of Man that doth Evil These are the 4 murthering Spirits But glory honour and peace to every one that worketh righteousness c. Here are the three last Spirits of the seven viz. The 5th the Light or Love-fire signified by Glory The 6th the sound or spirit enabling to heavenly Songs of Praise signified by honour And the 7th the Body or Sabbath in which all the other six spirits being by the 5th and 6th brought into harmony do inhabit rest and dwell signified by Peace CHAP. VII Demonstrations of the Spirit producing Light and the Love fire 1. THis demonstrates it self in every thing more or less on this side the hellish Principle but the first four excluding Addition are in and in a sort compose comprehend and include the dark World and That is the harsh Astringency strong Attraction raging Anguish and hungry Fire These limit the first or hellish Principle which can never comprehend the Light for That never proceeds to enkindle it for it wants oil and must ever want it because their perpetual Enmity doth ever more dry it up 2. Now that which composeth Peace is where the fire proceedeth to the blowing up of Light the Meekness whereof satiateth the hungry Fire and becomes food for the other three Spirits who before like Milstones without Corn grind and impetuously rub and grate each other 3. This did Lucifer and his Legions till the gracious Jehovah not being pleas'd that so great a space of the Salitter as that now included by the Stars should remain under the Darkness which then cover'd that Deep call'd for Light which was this 5th Spirit and its appearing caus'd each of the other four to kiss and sweetly strengthen the other and draw all one way and not prey one on another 4. The Scripture saith Perfect love casts out fear for fear hath torment which it doth by taking away the enmity and harmonizing the first four forms of the discording Spirits Love is the fulfilling of the Law for it doth all suffers all and that always but until the 4th Spirit the Fire attains the Light and Love Spirit the first four neither do nor can fulfil the Law but undo all by their Dissonancy The three first years the fruits in Canaan were to be accompted as uncircumcised The 4th year to be of Praise to the Lord but not to be eaten till the 5th year The three first years signifie the three first Forms of the eternal Nature viz. Binding Attracting and Anguish which before enkindling of the other four Forms are enemicitious and the foundation of the hellish Principle But the 4th year was the fruit to be of Praise to the Lord more nearly than the other because out of it is enkindled the light and love-flame Yet the Tribes of God were not to eat it till the 5th year for then it became good nourishment by the enkindled Light and principle of Love and not before The sweet Perfume was only of four Heterogeneous Ingredients viz. Stacte or Stacus a bitter tasted Arabian flower and Onyca a sweet spice of each a like quantity signifying the two first Forms which are both alike strong or alike weak every where The third is Galbanum very stinking signifying the third Form the Anguish The fourth is pure Frankincense a Gum of sweet Odour to feed the Fire which Fire is the fourth Form Obj. Will any say How are we concern'd to penetrate into the distinct Forms and Properties of Nature call'd fountain Spirits Is not this the tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil which Adam fell by searching sounding and feeling after with neglect of the tree of Life Answ. It is true he should not have known this experimentally for his knowing the third Principle separated from the second was as fatal had not infinite Mercy interposed as the knowledge of this which is the first Principle had been to Lucifer and his Angels But Man being fallen it is as highly profitable to him to have the distinct understanding of this as it was hurtful to our first Parents for as the Physitian and Chyrurgeon ought to find the spring of disorders in the Sick or the depth of the Wound even so here our knowing this is as the spreading the snare in the sight of a Bird. This appears it that the Lord is the All in all things with the froward he will shew himself froward c. These four Fountains are the indissoluble band the root of all things visible and invisible the immediate cause and strong might of all eternal things and with the interposition of second causes may be truly said to be the cause of transitory Beings for these are the root of their roots the cause of their causes the instrumental first Mover of their Motion and Parent of their immediate Parents Daniel's vision of four Monarchies figureth the four first Forms all which excluding the 5th viz. the enkindling the Light are called four great Beasts 1. The first like a Lion viz. the
two Figures 3. The first Principle or Fathers Property as one entire Essence without dividing the Tinctures of Female from the Male which though cut in pieces whence all Multiplicity exists yet is still one not to be divided from it self as was the Burnt Sacrifice the only whole Offering without reserve 4. It figureth the Man before he had trod any steps towards his Fall for he was of the entire one though consisting of many Parts yet able wholly to go up to the Lord as the whole Burnt-offering did 5. The second grand Sacrifice was the Peace-offering which differed from the Burnt as was noted 1. In being as well of Female 2. Restrained only to the Herd and Flock whereas both Burnt and Sin-offerings might be also of Fowl and Meat-offering 3. It differed from the other two in that its Fat and Inward part was the Lords and the rest the Priests but not to be eaten by any legally unclean Person The Peace-offering had also a double Figure 1. It represented the second Person of the Glorious Trinity 1. In that in him the two Natures were united 2. In whom the two Tinctures Male and Female were resumed into one Person which we see in that the Sacrifices were of two and only of two Kinds Agen They were severed into two parts the Fat of the Inwards from the rest that was the Lords the rest the Priests but was Holy and not to be eaten by any legally unclean Person 2. 6. The Peace-offering was the Figure of the New Man in whom the disappeared Image which the first Adam lost is revived by which re-union the fallen Man is become new which renewed Man is sanctified to be the Priests part but the other viz. The renewing Image is Gods part So in the Revelation it 's said And hath made us Kings and Priests viz. according to these two Images 1. The Image of God or renewing Power 2. The renewed part the Consort Associate and Servant ever resigning it self to the Will of that Image of God or Renewer So that the Servant becomes also Holy and may not be toucht by any unclean Person Will or Spirit 7. The third grand Sacrifice was the Sin or Trespass-offering which differed from the two former 1. In the General It was to be only a Bullock 2. In Particular to the several sorts of Sinners and Occasions were appropriated several sorts of Sacrifices 3. In the Place where it was to be Sacrificed viz. The Fat at the Altar for Burnt-offerings but the Carcass Hide and Dung in a clean place without the Camp This figureth the third Principle as it comprehends the fallen Apostatized Man The Bullock figures the fallen Humanity the Fat the Heavenly Humanity or Restoring Tincture which was only the Lords and it alone worthy to be offered at the Altar But the Carcass Hide and Dung the sensual impure sinful Man was carried out of the Camp yet it must be to a clean place where it must be burnt not said to be offered for it was too vile But the Burnt-offering is call'd the continual Burnt-offering 8. A Monk of the same Monastery and time with Luther having compleated the time enjoyn'd them for Prayer added asking Whether he had not now done what was fully sufficient Had an audible Answer in these words viz. Redde mihi mediam Lunam solem canis iram Give me the Half-Moon the Sun and the Anger of the Dog 9. The words import to my understanding as follows by the Three Things required his whole three Principles or whole Man his Soul Spirit and Body for by the Anger of the Dog the first Principle is charactered which excluding the Light is cornprised in the first four Forms extendeth no higher than to fiery Rage and is the state or place called in the Revelations without where are Dogs 2. The Sun which was required to be given evidently signifieth the second Principle which the outward Sun representeth 3. The Half-Moon meaneth his third Principle which corporiseth the Elementary Concrets and influenceth their Mutations by her own Regular Laws in Conceptions Progressions Maturations and Transmutations Resolvings and Declensions of Terrestials and in the fluxes of the Tides 10. But if to another Man my Constructions square not be it left as that on which is hanged no stress but a great probability The three Principles of Sal Sulphur and Mercury compose every thing that hath a created Being from the top of Heaven to the bottom of Hell as I may phrase it in the Dark light and mixt Worlds or Out-birth CHAP. XV. Of Jehovah and the Creation 1. LET us now after a View of the Three Principles come to a summary disquisition how brief soever yet that may some way assist the willing Mind how through the Creatures to discover some glimpse of the Omnipotent Majesty whose Offspring we are or rather whose Offspring we were really retaining in our depravity only some faint Reflections and nigh worn out Impressions of that dear beauteous Image we had 2. A glance of the Most High in the Face of his only Son is without Comparison infinitely preferrable to all the most sublime Speculation and Wisdom of Man for it is That we lost by the Fall and the knowledge of That is That we are taught to hope for in our Restoration by Jesus Christ. 3. And though it be hard yet possible to all in whom the Light hath so enkindled Love as they search for it as for hidden Treasure And because we are as one Purblind not able to see afar off we are to seek by things within our Ken and thence is it the Apostle saith The invisible things of him from the Creation of the World are clearly seen being understood by the things that are made his Eternal Power and Godhead 4. By his Eternal Power is understood according to the first Principle the indissoluble Band the Father's Property according to which he is a consuming Fire and that Work call'd his strange Work and his coming forth to that his coming out of his place 5. But by his Godhead is understood according to the second Principle or Son's Property in which he is Jehovah Gracious and Merciful long-suffering and abundant in Mercy and Truth Mercy it self forgiving Iniquity Transgression and Sin 6. Now to know God really and truly in any measure is to know the Son of God who is the Regenerator by the Co-operation of the Holy Ghost in some measure cleansing the Heart of every thing that may be call'd Self and subjecting it to the Obedience of the Holy Universal Will making it run with Delight and Joy in that Way which to the unmortified part is grievous 7. For his first four Forms having by the Grace of God generated the fifth the Love in the Light the Soul thus divinely irradiated falls very sick of Love and nothing can give Ease and Content longer than while he is following his Beloved either by patient waiting for him or doing
Transformation of Nebuchadnezzar that his Hairs were as Birds Feathers and his Nails as Claws 14. Such a Subjection hath our Elementary Structure lapsed into by the Fall that it may as really be Transformed as an unburnt Earthen Vessel may And that tho' usually by consent of the Will as in Witches 15. Yet may it also be sometimes without consent and by the Arch Enemy be imposed on as was the Woman at Isenach who in a Conflict of fifteen or sixteen hours was Transformed into That of a Calf her Hands and Feet bent and like Horns or Hoofs her Tongue rough and dry her Body cold and swoln yet her Soul found to be safe and her Body by Prayer Restored to its Human Form 16. Man became vain in his Imagination and his foolish Heart was darkened They were Worshippers of Angels of the Host of Heaven of Devils of Brute Creatures of Garlick as in Egypt of Stocks Things almost incredible to us That Rational Creatures should make Their Hope and Confidence to be in Irrational till we reflect on all Nations in This Age pretending Improved Skill and Knowledge yet still do place Their Confidence in Money CHAP. XX. Of Mans Recovery how he was helped again by Christ and by what wonderful way and method Redemption was is wrought 1. WHO is sufficient to tell This what Vessel may carry This Treasure It was studied by the Holy Angels is the Ornament of Heaven will be the Song in Eternity It is the sum of what the Spirit of God hath been dictating to the Prophets pointing at by the Law and Ceremonies proclaiming by the Apostles and Saints in His Word in the Mouth of all his Servants thro' all Generations 2. Now tho' none can say how high the eighth Sphere is much less the Infinity beyond or without it yet every one can measure his own heighth being really part of it So as far as can be reached by So vile a Nothing some particle of the Abyss of Grace may in Childish Simplicity be stammer'd out and haply some Assistance given to Such Inquirer whose Inward Senses shall be opened in any degree of aptness to the Sublimity of the Matter and whose Spirit shall be Humbled and held back to the lowly manner of exhibiting the same 3. All Knowledge not leading us Humbly towards Jesus Christ is Ignorance and compared with the Light set up in us by Him is Blackness with the Vertue of it is Dung with the Holiness and Purity of it is Filthiness with the Order of it is Confusion and Amusement of Spirit with the Utility of it is meer Loss of precious Time 4. We have in the precedent Discourse beheld the direful shameful State Adam declined into by the Loss of the Divine Virgin of God's Wisdom with whom he should alwaies have lived in Purity Modesty and Perfection of Love Who whilst he stood his Soul was of the Might of Eternity his Spirit of the Pure Majestick Divine Light his Body out of the One Holy Element more Noble than seven times Refined Gold as the Shining Sun and capable to endure in Eternity 5. But Sin marr'd all his Holy Body degenerated as from Celestial Christal to Putrifying Carrion which must know Dissolution and for any Power remaining in him must have returned to the Divided Elements without hope of Recollection and Resurrection Which might cause some of the Antients who better knew what the body is come to be and what Principles and Elements compounded of than what at first it was much less what the Merciful Creator was about for Restoring his Lost Image It might strongly sway some Wise Men in several Ages to laugh at the Novelty of the Resurrection as did the Athenians 6. The Gracious and Merciful Creator pitying His Undone Creature of Love to His Own Precious disappeared Virgin Image having no motive from any want in Him of His Creature nor any worth in the Creature nor any ability remaining in His Creature to help Himself but of His Own Only Meer Free Grace and Goodness His Tender Bowels of Infinite Love wherewith His Compassions were enkindled did set Infinite Power and Wisdom on work to supplant the Serpent in Man by reimplanting again the Dear Bride of Purity and Modesty to whom Adam was at first Married but had adulterously causlesly and foolishly left having treacherously abandoned himself and betaken to the Divided Properties 7. God in-spake again the Ingrafted Word saying The Seed of the Woman shall break the Serpents Head which Word so reimplanted was like a spark of Fire falling into Tinder or like Seed sown or like Leven hid in three measures of Meal for it was a Living Power a Speaking Witness It was call'd the Lamb slain from the Foundation of the World the Powerful Love of Jesus Christ the second Person of the Trinity who by That Power of Love filleth all places in the Heavens and Earth in His Own Holy Principle and This Love is Jesus Christ Himself 8. The second Adam and Holy Seed did not only come in the Fulness of Time into or in the Womb of the Virgin Mary when He took Flesh but then at the instant of Adam's Fall at the Father's in-speaking did implant himself to overthrow the work of the Devil 9. And stood at the Door of Adam and Eve and alwaies standeth at the Door of every Child of Theirs ever since none excepted in the Light of Their Life Preaching Salvation and with the Mighty Power of the Holy Ghost reproveth Sin convinceth of Righteousness judgeth Disobedience and warneth all more or less of the Judgment to come 10. This Living Word or Word of Life hath call'd it self by several names for all names are in it It is the Refiners Fire a Light shining in a Dark place Emmanuel The Saviour The Hope of Israel The Rock of Ages The Redeemer Love Wisdom Righteousness The Holy Thing Life Eternal where-ever and in whomsoever Obedience is yielded It is of invincible Strength will any lay hold on it brings irresistible Arguments will any lay them up in their Hearts uninterrupted Peace will any sit still under its Counsels His Weapons can neither be warded nor blunted His Defensives are impenetrable 11. The Word replanted in Adam and Eve after Their Disobedience is call'd an Ingrafted Word tho' it was carried downward chiefly or most visibly in the direct Line thro' Seth to Enoch who was in the Sabbath as the Seventh Day of whom came Metâ—usalaâ— who as the longest Liver recorded figured Eternity yet was the same in Them as a Priesthood to be Leaders and Stars to Their Brethren The same Principle being with less Brightness in others also for neither is the Sun visible but to Them who have a Receiving Power So nor were the rest of Mankind wholly Blind but had Their Talents entrusted to Them And this Line of the Holy Seed were as the Lord's Candlesticks and Lamps whereat others were to enkindle their weaker Lights 12. It may be noted that the
the Virgin remains a Creature not so mixt as to be confounded and swallowed up by the Deity 3. The two Men in White testified he should so Descend as they had seen him Ascend as is also asserted in the 11th Particular of the Incarnation 4. But the New Man is the Heavenly New Man or Heavenly Humanity of Jesus Christ being the humble pure Virgin of Wisdom which Adam lost and as it were died to him disappeared retiring into its own Ether The first Adam had as it were repudiated This Chast Holy Image This is by the second Adam the Lord from Heaven restored and married to His and in His to our Earthly Humanity It was His at the instant when the Holy Ghost overshadowed the Virgin Mary It is Ours when by the Holy Ghost we are begotten again and That Divine Image is awakened and stirred up in us 5. Of This let none marvel that my weak hand begs Strength and delights to speak for This is That dear pretious Image of Virginity Purity and Modesty whose Eternal Perfect Sweet Love was by Apostate Adam exchanged for the Lust of a Woman which soon sway'd him to Mortality 6. This as the Sun to the outward World would have been Man's Guide being her self out of the Abyss of Infinite Wisdom This the Promised Seed bringing with him still sweetly and convincingly woo's at the Door of every Man's Heart 7. But in regard she is Heavenly she can have no acquaintance with one that is resolved to be Earthy she will be Married only to That Soul that It regenerateth which Nicodemus understood not at first and none ever can who like not to be divorced from the Old Man and die daily To others these Writings are Sounds not Substances for This Tree of Life may not be toucht by them who love That of Good and Evil. 8. This Heavenly Humanity that disappear'd when Adam fell yields the Water of Life which becomes a Well springing up to Eternal Life This is the Childrens Bread It fills Paradise feeds the Angels and all the Blessed for ever 9. This is the Quintessence of Things the Holy Element whence streamed out the four Elements It is the Life and Vertue of the Eternal Nature or great Mystery It is That Pearl which whoso finds and buys is a cheap Bargain whatever it costs 10. This is Christ's Heavenly Flesh and Blood wherewith he feeds His in the Sacramental Feast But being come now to That which men make occasion of Controversie it may be profitable to discourse it John 6. from 47. v. to 59. v. And again in 63. v. it is said I am the living Bread that came down from Heaven v. 53. Except ye eat his Flesh and drink his Blood ye have no Life in you 11. The Jews understanding This as many still do to be meant of his outward Flesh and Blood said and that rightly How can This Man give us his Flesh to eat for That had been so understood not intended by him and Canibal-like to them 12. But the Lord interprets himself first Negatively in 63. v. not his outward Flesh as they thought to be meant profiteth nothing But Affirmatively v. 50. and 58. the Lord himself is express That the Flesh he meant was also Bread and that Bread was the Bread which came down from Heaven viz. the Word of God Hence arise Two controversial Points different from each other and both from the Truth 13. One Party say they eat the outward flesh which being eaten they swallow into their Beastial Carkass This the other Party opposeth saying That flesh though now glorified remains a Circumscriptive Creature therefore may not be eaten every where at once and that it is not Many but One therefore may not be eaten at all This last Party in opposition to the former yet farther say they eat That Flesh and drink That Blood only by Faith or Imagination but know nothing of the Heavenly Flesh or Humanity but still understand only the outward Flesh. Though the Lord is express in This that it is the Spirit that quickneth the Flesh profiteth nothing and that his words are Spirit and Life and that it is That Bread which came or cometh down from Heaven 14. The Mouth and Eating of the Soul are real and substantial though not Palpable yet not Imaginary 15. It was not the outward Flesh and Blood they did eat and drink for He sate with them when they did eat and drink Shewing plainly that the Sacramental Flesh and Blood is the Divine Flesh and Blood that came down from Heaven 16. In This Enoch walked with God and fed so heartily on This Food that the Food of the third Principle would no longer down with him This New Wine made the Bottle New This like the Tincture that transmuteth Metals Enflamed and Translated his whole Man so that his very third Principle was swallowed up by the Divine second Principle By This all the Holy Men before Christ's Incarnation were nourished in their Pilgrimage on Earth and by This were carried home to their Native Country 17. This was the Rock that followed them in the Wilderness for they did all eat the same spiritual meat and drink the same spiritual drink and That Rock was Christ. 18. This is the Tree of Life which is Angels Food and had never returned to be the Food of the Fallen Posterity of Adam had not the second Adam opened a door in our hearts thro' which to enter and given as a mouth to eat it and receive Life and Vigour from it This First-Born of every Creature was Heir of all things 19. But This is not the Only begotten Son for so He is the true second Person of the Trinity and Lord of all things but This is the Created Son or Word who is the Heir of all things This is the New Man it is not said This is the Omnipotent God but That Holy Heavenly Image of God wherein the first Adam was Created and which on his Disobedience disappeared as to him and as to him was Dead and said to be the Lamb slain 20. This did the Only begotten Son of God bring with Him He who was the True Second Person of the Trinity did Reunite This in himself to the Fallen and so by Him Restored Human Nature and having made Men Priests made them also Kings reigning over the first and third Principles in Man irradiating and divinely governing the first and sacrificing the Wills-Lusts and misplaced Love to the third Principle 21. This Holy Thing was begotten by the Holy Ghost as the Pure Heavenly Humanity united to the Earthly or Fallen Humane Nature comprising the Essences of the Virgin Mary as a Daughter of Eve 22. The Lord saith He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath Eternal Life He saith not He that eateth and drinketh it worthily hath Eternal Life but he that eateth and drinketh For none can be said to eat That Flesh and drink That Blood that
eat and drink unworthily they eat and drink what is common to those that have not Eternal Life and but eat and drink the Elements only or what more is at most but Imagination grounded on and extended no farther than on the History Never the more enabled to enter into the Sufferings Dying and New Life of Christ. CHAP. XXIII Man's mistaken way towards a supposed Happiness 1. THE State of the Children of Adam is the same with Those Bebold I will hedge up thy ways with Thorns and wall a Wall that she shall not find her paths and she shall follow after her Lovers but she shall not overtake them and she shall seek them but shall not find them Then shall she say I will go and return to my first Husband for then it was better with me than now And God proceeds against the Apostate Adulteress to the end of v. 13. but in v. 14. and to the end of the Chapter returns her to him c. 2. Wise men in every Generation have sought in the Treasures of the Creation for Real Happiness and Rest And after they have div'd into the deep ransackt the many Mysteries obvious to Artists collected the scattered parcels of Felicity dispersed in the Earth pierced the Bowels of Nature as well Astral as Elementary Anatomised the Creatures and sum'd up their Totals Yet still could not overtake their Lovers but their way was wall'd up and some of them found theirs heâ—â—ed up perhaps with Thorns Many have sought the Living among the Dead every Creature eath told them it is not in Me. So their quest resulted in Dissatisfaction 3. Wise mens increase of Wisdom hath been the increase of Sorrow in which they lay down in the Grave forgetting and being forgotten their Thoughts perishing they left sad Memento's of the Vanity of every thing Those of them only have been truly Wise whom God hath led beyond their own into his School of the Love of Purity and Holiness as Job's three Friends Hermes and others such seem to be 4. For since the World by Wisdom knew not God those only were Truly Wise and still are who ceasing from things Visible are guided to things Eternal 5. Our Lesson is as to the Wisdom of This World to become Fools and as such to crucifie our Wills to the Lusts of the Eye Lusts of the Flesh and Pride of Life and as little Children who Will nothing but the supply of Necessities and do without Contract Bargain or Regret what the Father bids His Will is their Principle And as a reward of their Resigned Obedience they know no perplexing Cares forecasting Fears crafty Excuses Dissimulation Malice c. but have a calm Serene Face a Peaceable contented Mind a câ—earful Innocent Behaviour while awake and when they lie down fall sweetly aslâ—ep CHAP. XXIV The Lord's way home for Man to follow 1. BUT Man hath travelled with the Prodigal from This White State To him straying will he suffer one that heartily wisheth the good of Souls to say Stand still and consider if a Good End be better than a Bad a Good Way must be better than an Evil for the Evil Way tends to a Bad End 2. And to shew whether his way be not bad let him look narrowly heedfully and impartially into his own Heart and Inclination where he shall find a Body of Self-Love coveting to get All which comes from the first Form the Aâ—tringency 3. Next He shall find an eager Desire to be Exalted and Great above others which Pride cometh from the second Form of Nature the Attraction or Constringency 4. Next He shall perceive a contemning despising and envying of others That he thinks he exceeds in Worth and they him in Fortune or the like which he fretteth at This proceeds from the third Form of Nature the Anguish 5. And then he shall find violent Anger Rage and Fury when crost or curb'd by any one which cometh of the fourth Form of Nature the Fire 6. And under these four Heads Troops of Sins Appendixes to these which well consider'd may make him much rather than blessed Paul cry out Oâ— wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from the Body of this Death He may now see how Evil in themselves these Disorders and hellish Principles are and how Evil to him how Dangerous to erect a Government in his private particular Soul opposite to the One entire gracious universal omnipotent Will and Government 7. When thus the Light of Jesus Christ ariseth it both sheweth the Malady and the Cure And this Light is not under a Bushel but as universal yet not seen by the wilfully Blind as the outward Sun to all Mens outward Senses The voice of Wisdom calls at every Mans Heart and where they listen it teacheth 7. To dye to the tyranny of their own Wills and so be like Children for Mens own Wills compass them about with sparks of their own kindling viz. Common Fire not that of the Altar which leads them in the Dark to lye down in Sorrow for as far as Adam did and we still do introduce our Wills into the third Principle we are like sad Eclipses in Hostility against the Heavenly out-goings 8. The true Divine Light of Jesus Christ where it is followed generateth a warm chearing dear â—ove to the New Man growing out of the Old as in a balance the New is lift up in that degree of Swiftness as the Old sinketh down It springeth out of the Old as a fair Flower out of the dark Earth as it were out of the Grave of the Old 9. This Light of Jesus Christ also so winneth on the Soul that it is resigned to the Guidance of true Wisdom being that of the Universal Holy Will For finding their own to be deceiving and deceived they become to it as Fools for Christ's sake not only content but habitually longing to know nor do nor be any thing but what their crucifyed Lord willeth in them 10. This Light having kill'd the perverted Will wrought Divine Love and Resignation doth betroth the Soul to the Virgin of Modesty and Purity again from whom Adam departed whom the Lord from Heaven the second Adam brought with him by him she was re-espoused to the Humane Nature no more to be Divorced For Man having Travelled by Art into Nature by his own Wisdom like a dark Head steered his own Will to the Designs of a Corrupt Heart and laboured all Night catching nothing wherewith being weary learns to Obey and be as a little Child and then finds rest yet in such degree and proportion as his continuance in Child-like Obedience is more or less Universal and Stedfast 11. Adam lost and we lose the Heavenly Virgin of Purity and Modesty by finding and living to the Lust of the third Principle viz. The seeming Wisdom guiding to obtain the mistaken satiety of Pleasure Profit and Honour by the Elementary palpable Transitory and
Aâ—tral World 12. When Man makes these idolatrously the object of his Love Hope Delight and Confidence as the rich Man in the Gospel did which should be used only as a Picture or Glass through which to Contemplate by Divine Skill the Eternal Powers represented by them He catcheth at a Shadow worships the Ass on which he was to Ride 13. It is evident his thus Living to his third Principle was his and is our Dying to and Loss of the second Principle and 't is as clear the Dying to the Third that is only giving it leave to hang to us as an old loose Garment or looking through it as through a Cloud or Medium on the Sun or regarding it as a Letter much blotted for the Esteem we bear to the Hand whence it came or as a much faded imperfect Portraicture of an Absent Friend or as a Perspective-Glass Thus only to use it is rightly to Live to it which is really to Die to it and so to Die to it is really to Live to the second Principle and to reunite to the Eternal Chast Holy Modest pure Virgin which disappeared on Adam's disobedient Lusting for the Lusting awakeneth the Knowledge of Evil and Good which the Virgin abhorreth and left Man should be quite stranged 14. Therefore to Extricate us of this miserable Toil came the Son of the Virgin whose Doctrine teacheth us That it is a greater Blessedness to give than to receive for that the Holy Light World consisting in the Might and Vertue of the second Principle cannot be supported and receive Nourishment from the divided Properties of the third which consisteth of Transitory mutable Powers because what is of Good in those outflown Powers is the free Gift out of the Abyss of the true and greatest Blessedness the second Principle 15. All therefore who Die not to the Lesser cannot Live to the Greater Blessedness if we Die not to all things but Christ we are unworthy of Him Whatever is divided from Him is Dead for He only is Life and God is called God according to His infinite Abyss of Light Love Life Goodness and second Principle for according to the first is a consuming Fire 16. Man living to the Cheating Pleasure of the third Principle is Dead as the Widow is said to be who liveth in Pleasure We startle at being Adulterers Idolaters c. yet so we are while we Live that is till we Die with Christ. Till we pass through Death that is truly and really Die to the Wrath fierâ—eness and Dark Anguish of the first Principle the Root of the Soul as to the Father's Property And until we Die to the Deceitful Volatil Bewitching Pampering Lust of the third Principle whereinto Man's outward Body like those of the Beasts is fallen wherein also lodgeth the Curse till This be we are Dead as to God But being indeed mortified to both these we arâ— in the same degree raised again to live the Life of Jesus Christ a Life of Love Humility Patience chearful Submission and Obedience as our Progress to the Death of both these extends and ascends or amounts unto 17. For the Death to these two Principles as to their Prevalence is such an emptying us of our selves as enables without Reluctance to Pray the Lord to exercise his whole Will in us and on us regarding in nothing its Greatness or Contemptibleness its Sweetness or Bitterness its Gratefulness or grating Temper but only esteeming every thing without Reflection or Sticking ever equally acceptable that the Divine Will shall direct and allot us to do or submit to 18. And this Life of Sacrifice hath a thankful Reverence in it and is as whole as the Burnt ones were without the least reserve This Life is no longer ours for we are first Dead But is the Life of Christ the meek Child like Life taught us by the Cross of Christ the Footsteps of the Lord are plain and conspicuous in this good Path. 19. It is both in Word and in Power but neither is the Word or Power ours but 't is the Holy Word and Power whence Adam departed as the fallen Angels had done before and in which Word and Power the Blessed Angels converse and are Established In which Adam might have lived Gloriously without knowing the Cross as do the Angels 20. But the restored Image grows not but under the Cross Thus did Abel under the Hate of Cain Enoch and Noab under the Pressures of the highly wicked old World Lot under the filthy Sodomites And infinitely above all thus did our Almighty Saviour whom if we will follow it must be in Deepest Humility bearing his Cross which must be also ours divesting our selves of all Self-pleasing and whatsoever fallen Man calls and thinks to be his for this is the Holy Soul's weaning time when as Heirs of the Faith of Abraham they also keep a great Feast as he did at weaning Isaac 21. This Feast is a real feeding on the Heavenly Flesh and Blood of Christ a Drinking of the Water that becomes a Spring of Water in us to Eternal Life It is a Life hid with Christ in God a walking with God and a putting on the Lord Jesus Christ the Marriage Supper and Wedding Garment a Peace passing the understanding of all except the Children who are regenerated and to them only known in such measure ordinarily as they have made Progress in Mortification and so grow in the new pure Image of God restored us by Jesus Christ. 22. For a close let all be warn'd not to contemn if they understand not some things and so judge themselves unworthy of this Childrens Bread The Reason why so few understand the Holy Scriptures which yet many often read is because few give up their Wills to Obey and Regeneration is the Necessary Qualification to attain true Wisdom Hence is it that from a Corrupt Mind though refinedly Penetrating the Writings of the Blessed Jacob Behmen are Seal'd up and as if Dumb from such were the very Sermons of the Lord himself who so spake as never Man spake hidden And none of the wicked shall understand but the wise shall understand Here endeth the Considerations c. The 177 Theosophick Questions of the blessed Jacob Behmen divide themselves into Ten grand Distributions or Kinds being of so many various Aspects viz. THE first four Questions are most immediately concerning God in his Infinite Abyss The ten following concern Angels good and bad from the fifth Inclusive to the fifteenth Exclusive The 23 next succeeding are of the Creation in general ranged into three distinct Eminencies deduced from the 3 Principles making in all 37. viz. 1. That out of the first Principle or dark Abyss in the 15th 16th and 17th Questions 2. That out of the second Principle the Angelical holy World in the 18th and 19th Questions 3. That out of the third Principle the Visible Creation and contrariety in it from the 20th Question inclusive to the 38 exclusive The one and forty
Horrour and stupendious Epitome of the Dark Centre doth therein subsist ever enkindling in his own Body and every Member of it being the whole Dominion of the Dark Troops one entire supply as out of a Fountain of Fury Rage and Fierceness as naturally as do issue Contagious Emanations from a Plague Sore or the Mortal Fumes from the Dead Sea affecting the Birds attempting to flie over it as is reported 5. And this He doth really as the Sun doth the glorious bright Beams or the Ocean swelleth the Veins of Springs which empty back into it or as Fogs ascend from corrupt Lakes and in This God's Infinite Abyss of the first Principle is as the bottomless Deep to a fragment of a thin Superficies or the Heat of the Sun to an Object through the Burning-glass affording an unsearchable immediate supply of the Treasure of Wrath with an hungry desire thereunto Thus doth the Breath of the Lord like a River of Brimstone enkindle that Lake where they have made themselves as Fuel fully ready dry 6. And as a good Graft or Branch inoculated into a Crab-stock produceth fruits of its own property tho' it be fed by the sour Stock haply delightful warm spicy grateful quite other than the Crab it self so contrariwise doth Lucifer and his Hellish Legions appropriate to themselves only That out of the Abyssal Principle wherein themselves inhabit whereof they subsist and whereby they are shut up and comprehended which their depraved Bodies can only assimilate that is the six working Properties enraged to extremity by the withdrawing of the Divine Holy Principle 7. And as Lucifer and his Angels did in the time of this World abuse all the Holy Names and Powers they could reach profaning them to effect their filthy Impostures so shall they desire ever to do but the Astral Influences which like Gold and Poisonous Mercury commixed yielding matter for their fallacious Jugling being once withdrawn then can they only in their Black Magick excessively and insatiably hunger to repeat as before their Blasphemies but remain impotent and no more seise on it than a man can on a shadow nor reach it than Dogs the Moon they bark at because all the good Intermixing Powers are for ever withdrawn into their several peculiar Ethers 8. Also as the Evil Legions do according to their various Orders and Properties more exceed some in one some in another of the four Central Forms of the Dark Abyss So Lucifer as the Centre of them all abounds at once in every one in the most capacious degree of a Creature Thus we see some Fish found on one Coast Arm or Channel some other sorts on another quarter latitude or bosom yet in the Sea are all sorts at once So That once Brightest of Angels and now Blackest of the Deformed Furies is the Comprehender of the various Anguishes and all in the extreamest degree a Creature possibly may and in that respect according to the Dark Impression imageth most exactly the Infinite first Principle 9. And tho' Lucifer and his numerous Legions who are as much his and have a Will as fixedly dependant on and with his as the Leaves do on the Will of the Tree have refused and been unworthy the Honour and Blessedness of retaining the Image and serving the Glory of the Holy dear Principle of Love and Goodness but by forming themselves according to Enmity Filthiness and Deceit would break their Order stray and think to free themselves from the Bands of the Almighty be their own Lords exercise a peculiar Tyranny by which Exorbitant Lust they willed to quit the Duty they owed the Universal Soveraign and sought a Happiness beyond the limit thereof he would be a Mock-God assume Rule Authority and Self-Soveraignty Yet did as one who would put out his own Eyes that himself might be invisible 10. Wherefore now if he will no longer be a Child of the Day he must be a Captive in the Darkness if he will not serve his God in the fulness of all things he must serve the Forms of Enmity in the want of all things if he will shut himself up from the golden State of Purity wherein he lived for the delight of his God he must be an Anguish Fountain as Ruâ—â—y Iron which yet is of use among other parts of the Creation and his own Rigour is his clog as bitter Astringency curbs the corroding Anguish of Mars The Magistrate hath Executioners for Capital Crimes who have not a contrary Will to the Justice of their Lord though adverse to his Clemency The Prince hath Armed Troops whose will is the same with his Imperial Commands to prosecute his Enemies with Fire and Sword and whose Life like that of Beasts and Birds of Prey is to prosper in the Destruction of others 11. Here may the Apostles words be applied Behold the goodness and severity of God to them that fell severity but to thee goodness if thou continue in his goodness Let it not be thought that by the Rebellion of Lucifer God hath lost the least part of His infinite Glory for as Lucifer and his Legions are gone into a Will Desire and Hunger opposite or adverse to the delighted or well-pleasing Will of the Goodness and loving Kindness of God in his Son the Lord Jesus Christ the Image of whom they bare yet are they gone no farther but to be comprehended in and made one Will Desire and Hunger in and with the fierce Wrath and Vengeance of the Almighty Father in His first Principle without generating His Delight his Son the Lord Jesus Christ the least doubt whereof is derogatory to the Glory of God's Omipotence nor can they possibly have any other Will but that of Enmity and Wrath being departed from that of Love for Love is the Cement Chain or Ligament the want whereof renders every Property at utter Hatred and loathing of any other Property Now though in the Holy World are all the Powers yet without the least Dissonance because Love fills them all Object 12. But the Mind of some may Judge that to say that Lucifer and his Angels have one Will with the Property and Wrath of the Father seems absurd for God having no greater fixt Enemy than the Devil That Enemy cannot have one Will with God And that to say there is something in God which is not God is to say there is something in God which is not himself which were rather Madness than Folly rather Blasphemy than Error for it divides the Infinite One from the Infinite One A. 1. By way of Concession 1. Lucifer and his Legions are at Enmity against God 2. There is nothing in God but what is God 3. That God cannot be divided from or against Himself for an Infinite cannot be divided against an Infinite 13. 2. It is answered by way of Solution 1. That though Lucifer and his Angels are at Enmity against God yet it follows not but they may be subservient to his Omnipotence as we see
Extraction as to its Original It is always Morning with it bearing equal date with God's other Attributes and so with God himself 9. God being infinitely all that he is is also infinitely Just and Almighty True and Faithful we can no more say his Grace and Love to have Priority than the Light of a Candle can precede the firing the wiek or than Man's Intellect could precede the enkindling his Humane Soul or than the Fruit can prevent the Tree or That the Root 10. Can we well conceive the Eternal Permanence of God's Goodness and why not his Infinite Power and Justice is there room to doubt that to be a part of him 11. Must the Fruit and Flower live and not the Root must the Eye see if the Man dye or the Candle shine when the Wiek is cold Then may the Principle of Sweetness Meekness Grace and Love survive the Principle of Strength Might Potence and Wrath. The last Branch of the Question is Why hath God poured forth Eternal Wrath 12. God according to the first Principle is not called God but a consuming Fire nor is he called God according to the out-birth or third outward Principle for the Devil is called the God of this World though Divine Omnipotence guides and restrains in all Occurrences for no place or space excludes him for God is in it or more properly it in Him comprehended by Him yet God's infinite Abyss of Love and Goodness is His Heaven That his Throne 13. When God created Angels the first race of Intellectuals known to us they were made out of Himself of his Abyss of Might and His Abyss of Goodness or of His first and second Principles Darkness and Light in such Excellency as are the Angels who so continue 14. When also God created Man His second race of Intellectuals it was out of the two former Principles in Conjunction with the third yet in such sweet order as we know little of a glimpse whereof is seen in the resigned humble regenerate Soul who lives in God and hath there His Possessions and Reversions about that is employ'd His Fear Care Grief also His only Delight and Satisfaction both for time and for ever yet all this is but a glimpse of what we were at first and shall be at last 15. These things being premised give us a prospect what good beautiful excellent Creatures Angels and Men were and should all have continued to be 16. For if God had willed the one to be Devils the other to be inwardly so and outwardly Beasts How is it they were all created Divine and perfectly Good 17. But they directly against the confessed Will of the gracious Creator who never did nor ever can will any thing sinfully Evil but Good and only Good both the fallen Angels and Adam formed in themselves a Will perverse to the Sovereign Will shutting up their whole selves from the only true Guide and Eternal Light and Wisdom and so became Dark and such Fools for whose back is the rod and being Estranged snuffed at Reproof grew into Scorning Enmity and Diametrical contrariety and hatred of Holy things 18. Their own private will became their God for having broken the sweet Bands of Love they made a League with Hell and Death for the Divine Light withdrawing or rather they declining its Councels the dark fierce fire became their very Essence and Life under the domineering Power whereof the fallen Angels by their departure from the sweet Kingdom of Love and Peace have forever subjected themselves into which obstinate hardened Men also throw themselves And this is so contrary to God that his Spirit loatheth them and withdraweth and his so withdrawing is God's pouring out Eternal Wrath and the way how and cause why it is the Eternal Perdition Q. 17. Whereas God is and remaineth Eternally undivided what then is his working in the Place of Hell Is there indeed a certain Place of Hell or not A. 1. Here on a Position premised is a Question proposed and a second Question occasionally put It seems fit to strengthen the Concession by explaining it 2. That although every part of the Creation consisteth of various Heterogeneous and contrary Properties all which is not only derived from God but their Life Motion and Being is in Him yet 〈…〉 e from Eternity in Eternity the same undivided One 3. For if an Infinite were divided into Parts the Parts must also be Infinite and then must be more than one Infinite which were a Contradiction as equally vain as to say that Almightiness doth divide it self against Almightiness 4. But that the Infinite Almighty comprehendeth all Properties in perfect Supream Excellency is clear and that Himself remaining still in Himself can yet make Himself creaturely in Infinite Multiplicity is as clear and visible 5. The outward Sun consisting of Light and Heat can by its Beams help Generation of Infinite Productions Good and Bad even poisonous perilous Images of the dark World and this principally by His Heat but by His Light can attenuate penetrate and change gross dark Bodies yet Himself as the outward Agent of Omnipotence remain untouch'd unaltered unaffected unsubjected in any degree whatsoever by his so doing to the things wrought 6. For alluding to the instance in the Answer to the last preceding Question If Sin like a Burning-glass contract the hot Beams it may be intolerable to the Sinner or Object opposed to it yet is the glorious Sun still the unaltered same 7. The Gardner Roots up dryes and burns the Weeds The Sovereign Power guards the Peaceable and curbs the implacable But if the good Plant would wear out the strength of the Weed by extracting and transfusing into it self part of its Nutritive Property the good Plant may degenerate into a Wild one or Weed Also if a private Person shall unauthorized make himself a Judge or Publick Arbitrator he may fall into a Crime on the other hand for these things are the Gardener's Work to whom Vengeance belongeth Mens own Vindictive Desire is touching pitch 8. Now to Answer directly what God's Working in Hell is It is answered That his working there is only according to the first Principle according to which he is not called God but a consuming Fire 9. God's working in Hell convinceth Atheism to be an Error The Devils believe so as to make them tremble Men were loth to believe God made the World and Them though so evident as to leave them inexcusable this they are now assured of by His destroying both It and Them 10. God's working in Hell openeth every Book of Conscience Dives extenuates not his Crimes but roars out his Torments That Place of Darkness affords Light enough to read Guilt by and thereby give Immortality to that Worm 11. God's working there restores the Memory Dives had not forgotten his former calling of Abraham Father as if That would have Privileged him nor had he forgotten his Brethren who perhaps had run Parallel with him in
wherein the three behold themselves in parcels 9. But in Man behold themselves in one entire Image yet not in fallen Man but in the man Christ Jesus by whom and for whom are all things 10. The Idea and perfect Image of God is only in Christ yet not as He is the Second Person of the Three for so He is the inaccessible Light and the Original which is Imaged but He is the perfect Image of God as He is the Divine Humanity or Heavenly Man the First-born of every Creature This Virgin-Image was in Adam before he lusted whereby he was in Christ God's exact Image having all the three Principles in due Harmony being the true Character Idea and Figure of the Glorious Trinity 11. This is also in an obscure and less conspicuous way in every one who is Begotten again by the Holy Ghost The mortified humble resigned Will entreth into the way of the Cross quietly patiently Love makes it sweet this is a putting on Christ for here the Lord is Born is Formed sways the Righteous Scepter Transforming that Soul into the Virgin Image in some degree but the glance of this stops my Hand extracts a Groan swallows me up I flame am almost devoured My Lord what is this Earthen House Q. 42. What was Paradise wherein God Created Man Is the same Alterable or Changeable and a Creature or doth it stand in the Eternal Ground A. It hath been reported that a Painter would have Drawn the Lineaments of the Lord when in Flesh which by reason of His Majestick Face he could not perform The like Fond attempt were it to Survey Paradise by Humane Art or Instruments which if it were a place cannot be found and if it prove a State or Principle cannot be comprehended 1. The Answer may first be Negatively that it is not a Place or Locality 1. Because then as the most worthy the Garden of Eden should not have been the place named for Adam's Seat whence proceeded the four Rivers but Paradise is not called the Garden nor is the Garden stiled Paradise 2. Nor is it changeable for though it disappeared as to the first Adam yet the second Adam granted it to the Thief 3. Positively Paradise is the one holy pure Element having its Eternal Fountain from the second Principle and every of the seven Properties are in it in great Purity and Splendor So that had any created Angel the Task perfectly to Epitomize it he could do it but according to his excellent measure yet not fully Nor to Human Apprehension for as Paradise is the heavenly Body of Christ so is it the Womb of Angelical Conception comprehending them but cannot be fully comprehended by them as neither can the Sun's lustre be by us comprehended 4. Heaven is Paradise and the Paradisical Principle is Heaven and when they are Contemplated their Glory swallows up all created Angels as well as Men. It is an Over-match to penetrate the Holiness Purity Immensity or rather Infinity Transparency Simplicity Variety Successive Formations with all Powers Colours Vertues Sounds Odours Substantials the Quintessence and Elixir of the outward Quintessence and Elixir the Harmony Peace Gravity and Eternity its ample Commensuration and Redundancy to the most noble expatiated sublime and exalted Capacities 5. So that proceed they never so far in this ravishing Traverse and Quest there is still a prospect of more and other they must say in our Father's House are many Mansions at whose right hand are Pleasures for evermore such as Eye hath not seen nor Ear heard nor hath entred into the Heart of Man to conceive 6. A faint Similitude may be a fresh springing flowry Meadow where stand Thousands of fragrant Flowers some more Beautiful than other all shewing their peculiar Beauties without grudging and how the Divine Vertue in the third Principle is become Material the tast whereof causeth the Creation to be in Anguish and Travel to be delivered from the Vanity and Groan after freedom from their Bondage 7. And though Paradise be not excluded this World yet a great Gulph interposeth betwixt it and the World the Mind when inflamed with Divine Love feels what the stammering Tongue cannot tell to others 8. The Corporeity of Paradise is not palpable that Salitter is Holy and Pure like that of the Angels viz a bright transparent visible Substance 9. It 's Birth or Productions are in all things and therefore immeasurable and innumerable which is thus to be discovered and understood Let the Divine Light and Vertue be likened to the Mind of Man The Paradisical Fruits to the Thoughts eacht Thought hath a Centre whence other Thoughts spring so also do those Heavenly Fruits proceed from and in unwavering Eternal Love 10. The Fire there is God the Father the Light God the Son the Air God the Holy Ghost It 's â—roâ—undity and Extent are not bounded 11. The Idea or Figure of the Creatures here are there but not their Spirit much less their Substance for for that End they were Created 12. All Holy Works stand there in their Figure and all Words spoken by the Human Tongue from a Divine Root as the wicked Works and Words do in Hell 13. I compare the Arabian Odours Oriental Gems Palms of Asia Wine of Pomegranates the American Pine-Apple and what else is most desirable in comparison of the Paradisical Productions to the obscure Vitality surviving in Mens Dead Bodies generating some as it were Fibres of Gold amongst the decaying Teeth and the Usnea on the Skulls of â—â—â—sons Strangled And all things of less Excellency in this World in comparison of Paradise to the Excrementitious growth of Hair and Nails in their Dormitories 14. I compare Man's outward Astral and Elementary Life to that in Paradise to idle deceitful Dreams some disquiet ones some wrathful some frightful some wicked and obscene many many ways Evil. And our Translation hence I compare to the Morning awakening time terrifying some as Slaves to their grievous Chains and hateful Drudgery and others as great Conquerors are usher'd in State to the Princely Triumphant Chariots 15. Say any say not all retaining the least degree above perfect Madness if Paradise be thus infinitely Good what shall I receive in exchange for it And how shall I search the Path leading to it What Key opens the Door of it 16. The Lord Himself tells us Except a Man be born again he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God And by way of Explanation addeth that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit And again Except ye eat the Flesh of the Son of Man and drink his Blood ye have no life in you and by way of Explanation addeth It is the Spirit that quickneth the Flesh profiteth nothing my Words are Spirit and they are Life 17. Where we see the New Birth and Eating Christ's Flesh are the same Also that to be spirited by the Spirit of Christ and to feed on the Word of Christ are the very same Whence it
beautiful exquisite person or as a contemptible soâ—tish natural Ideot to the most acute accomplisht profound contemplative experienced Philosopher or as a leprous deformed loathsom Body to the most rare perfect healthy one or as a maimed impotent treacherous Slave chained for term of Life in a stinking Dungeon to a prosperous renowned Captain at the Head of a mighty Victorious Army For how much a glorious pure blessed State exceeds a vile wretched perishing State so much doth the Food Adam had transcend ours That was the quintessence life and one holy Element this is the excrescence of the four Elements travelling and clogg'd by the Curse Q. 49. Should Adam in Paradise have eaten such fruit as the heavenly eating shall be after this time or where into should he have eaten where should the same have continued seeing all the Beings of this World are earthy and transitory and he only was an Eternal Heavenly Image and needed not the Vanity A. 1. Christ in His beginning of Miracles gave His best Wine at last which is applicable to us by way of allusion who are strayed when at last we return to our Native Paradifical Country 2. This Question leads me not to say what Adam's food was to have been for that falls under the 52 Question therefore restraining my self to the present enquiry which is whether his eating had been the same which shall be and where it should have been seeing he only needed not the Vanity and that this World hath nothing in it but what is transitory To which I answer 3. Paradice is the similitude manifestation and revealed Image of the incomprehensible God and is such a similitude as is in its infinite extent variety purity and eternity incomprehensible being in all such places and for ever more or less visible where God is more or less manifest in his Grace and Love for it is God's opened Book to Angels and the Blessed So that it cannot be said to have a Beginning End or Limit of Extent 4. In this blessed state or place was Adam's whole Man whose Third Principle as well as his First shone throughly and gloriously in the Lustre of the Divine Second Principle yet did his First and Third remain really such as they shall also continue to be in the Blessed after the Resurrection 5. Adam was in the Garden of Eden but was also in Paradice or the Heavenly State nor needed he nor should he have tasted the fruit of the Third Principle for that was poison to him Thus may be seen where his food lay and that tho he were in the Garden of Eden he was of a higher Principle as far above it Q. 50. Whether did the four Elements also Rule in Adam in his Innocency or but one only in the equality of likeness of the four Elements Did he also before he fell feel heat and cold A. 1. Adam's Body was not made of the four Elements if he had they had Ruled there 2. For first every Concrete is subject to the Powers whence it originateth but the very Beasts derive from a more noble Ruler viz. the Astral Spirit also 3. Because contrary Properties in Principles must produce contrary Qualities in Bodies compounded of them unless their contraries accord in a harmonious Cement now the divided Elements remain ever in irreconcileable equal distance 4. Because tho' Time is in Eternity comprehensibly and Eternity in Time incomprehensibly yet a transitory Root may not found an Eternal Tree thus from the transitory Elements come Vegetatives c. but such was not Adam's Body for it was capable of Eternity not measurable by Time 5. For these Reasons the four Elements were not Rulers in him but one in the likeness of the four but that one was holy consisting of all Powers in the perfection of Temperature whence were breathed the Astral Worlds and four Elements 6. But the Elements divided according to the four Anguishes of the Eternal dark Abyss or first Principle one into raging fierceness of Cold another in a clogging Body another into Evaporating and the other into scorching consuming Heat which it still is and over which and the Astral World was Adam put as over the rest of the Lords Handy-work far above the Extremities of the four Elements and precipitant driving of the Stars Q. 51. Should any thing have been able to Kill or Destroy Adam A. 1. That which hath a Temporary Root must from the Necessity of its own Structure suffer Mutation not that any Ens may properly be said to be annihilated but the Fabrick must separate and the Parts be resumed into their proper Aethers or first Principles 2. But so was not Adam therefore could not Perish from the Ruin of his own Foundation yet leaving the Place and Order where with his Gracious Creator had vested him he transform'd himself from the precious Image he had into such Deformity that for the Virgin to continue his Yoke-fellow longer was as impossible as it is for a Living Man to put off his Body and dwell in the Body of a Dead Man 3. This was Adam's being kill'd who as the Rebel Angels by imaging in themselves the Forms and Puissance of the first Principle withdrew them from the Meekness and Love of the second So Adam by imaging in his Will the Vanity of the Out birth or third Principle the Powers of the first became severally enraged his second Holy Principle obscured and his glorious Body otherwise Eternal became dark gross and bestial 4. For the Magical Soul and evil Spirit impressed on it the Image it had it self been infected with Thus the Immortal Man died that is Sin transmuted him into a degenerate deformed impure state Q. 52. What should have been Adam's Condition and Estate upon Earth What should he have done if he had continued in Paradise A. 1. When Good Angels humble themselves to become visible to the outward Eye they come as Strangers and when Evil ones intrude they borrow wherewith to hide their horrid Form but Adam was by his third Principle natural Proprietor and at Home 2. Yet as the Lord Jesus saith speaking of Children Their Angels always behold the Face of my Father which is in Heaven so at once they behold the Face of God and carefully Nurse the Children committed to them Thus also was Adam in the Garden of Eden as a Prince and Natural Lord by Donation of the Creation and then also walking with God in Paradise or Heaven and an Image of the Almighty Three beholding the Son of God who is as the Delight Heart or Face of the Father 3. As to what Adam's Food should have been 't is answered 1. Negatively Not the Earthy Meat or Mortal Water not that of the Elements nor Stars or Astral Spirit for all those have their Periods and are Transitory 4. But his Food was Bread and Water of Life Paradisical Food Immortal Fruits Angelical Pure and Eternally Substantial wherein no Vanity could insinuate 5. Will you say what
Will which Union is so absolute compleat and perfect thaâ— the Holy Angels and Blessed Men may be said to have no Will at all and their Unchangeable Happiness is their resigned Life wherein they lose themselves and find all for ever 2. As a Family is wholly at the guidance of the Lord of it so are they but on setting up an adverse Will the makers of the breach dye to the Will and Conduct of the Father of that Family and those making themselves their own Lords cut themselves off from the Family 3. Or as a Twig while it continues in the Fruit-tree hath one Will with the Tree but when once it is rent off and grafted into another Stock it gets another Will and another Life to bear other be it bitter sour or otherwise Evil Fruit. 4. Thus Adam and Eve impregnated themselves with the third Principle receiving a bestial Life from it and putrefying Nourishment their Divine Will Appetite and Knowledge did thenceforth immediately Die and was Extinguish'd Thus a well Educated Child apostatizing from his first Principles degenerating into contrary Practices dyeth to them and loseth his first Love Q. 74. What was the Voice of God in the Word when the Day grew cool How did God recall Adam How is this to be understood A. 1. By the cool of the Day is understood the time when Adam's Eternal Day was grown cool that is his Temperature was faln to Extremities of heat and cold also alluding to the End of a Natural Day which though hot closeth coldly 2. By the Voice of God is understood God's Anger in their Essences for they had awakened the Turba or Wrath in themselves Heaven they were at Enmity with 'twixt it and them was a firm inclosure of a whole Principle they might see Devils deriding them and Fear the Fate of Lucifer the Holy Angels had quit all intercourse with them nor could they help them 3. While this sad Knell was rung them their Fear of God's Voice was not only at that of his Wrath in them but that of his Love and Pity to which they were estranged such as the Earth trembled at when the Blood of the Lord descended on it from the Cross. 4. The Voice of the Lord moved and walked in the Gates of the Deep in Fire and Light in the first and second Principles and recalled them But concerning the recalling them the following Questions will require to Discourse of Q. 75. What is the Seed of the Wife or Woman and bruising and Treading upon of the Serpent What did God speak or breath again into them Was the same nothing else but an ouâ—â—ard Promise or an Incorporation of the effectual working Grace A. 1. The Womans Seed is not the Fire Soul which standeth in the first Eternal Principle It is not the Astral nor Elementary Principle or Power arising thence It is not the Eternal Son of God the second Person or Divine second Principle though the Lord in humbling Himself to take our Nature often calls Himself the Son of Man It is neither of these for the first is too hot the second too cold the third infinitely too high 2. But that which is properly the Seed of the Woman here intended is the Heavenly Humanity or true Virgin Image of God the pure Sophia consisting of Divine Wisdom and Modesty which was Married to Adam till his Transgression made a Divorce 3. This is that Grace which was here again inspoken into Adam and Eve and this is the Pearl which is to be searched after with all diligence which was not only barely promised but brought in the Word and ingrafted into the Light of their Life 4. This is the Lamb slain from the Foundation of the fallen World not only intentionally but actually for being in every of Adam's Offspring witnessing for God was resisted and slain in its strivings with the old World and downward 5. But where-ever the bent of the Will inclines to obey and subject it self to the Divine Councils in such was restored the joy of their Salvation ever pointing at the Lord who being the true Son of the Virgin in the fulness of time bringing this Virgin by taking Maries Essences consisting of all the principles and properties and making of two one by that power which is able to subdue all things unto himself 6. But so heavenly and pure is this that one that hath it cannot shew it to one that hath it not much less give it to such but he that hath it can stammer and speak by parcels and darkly by Parables for such what he saith will seem tho' it be not far from every one of us 7. He can give the other some directions where to dig for it also what it is like and what it is not like But Men are exceedingly perverted from it by the many Images their Astral Spirit imposeth on their Understandings So that the Invitations of pure simple and self-emptying Truth can hardly get audience more hardly obtain to be considered and penetrated but with highest difficulty get obedience from us and due Soveraignty over us 8. Men use their outward Senses so much and are so full of Objects occurring to them that they are strangers to the very existence of the Inward Sences forgetting what the Apostle saith That which we have seen with our Eyes heard with our Ears and our Hands have handled of the Word of Truth c. 9. The Men guided chiefly by the outward Sences are Sensual and Brutish and yet too much of that sticks to us all Such Maxims will not believe a Rock to be a shadow and Faith a substance they consider not that Visibles are transient and that which is not seen is Eternal whereof Faith is the evidence 10. Thus is the Lord from Heaven call'd the Son of God Son of Man and Seed of the Woman and is so at once perfectly and unchangeably 11. And fallen Man when once reunited to God by the death of the monstrous Image and restored to this new first pure Virgin Image are by this Seed of the Woman made the Sons of God See more to this purpose in the 81st and 90th Answers Q. 76. What is the Curse of the Earth what is thereby brought to pass A. 1. This Earthy Globe is very much unlike to what it was as our Bodies are also to that Adam's was for as Adam's Body was the Epitome of the whole Out-birth So this Globe was an Image of the Astral World and all the Properties and the Divine Principle did penetrate it as the Sun doth the Fruits so that the Earth was as much paradisical as it was capable to be but it had these bounds 2. That it could not be purer than the Root whence it proceeded viz. the Astral and Elementary and of those Heavens it may be said they are not pure in his â—ight 3. That it could not be more permanent than its Root and none doubts but of these it may be said they
humble that Sex who being the divided Tincture were first in the Transgression Q. 106. How was God viz. the Word made Flesh What hath he assumed from Man A. 1. In the 75 81 and 90 Answers and in the 15 particulars of the 21th Chapter of the little Treatise call'd Considerations c. on the Scope of Jacob Behmen much relating to the present Enquiry is opened Yet it seems fit to say farther viz. 1. That because Man's going into the third Principle had subjected him to the Mortal Bestial Flesh in the Wrath and Curse if the Word had not assumed and been made Flesh the Plaister had not been as broad as the Wound The Elementary part viz. that of the four Elements must for ever have remained Captive in Death and passed away with the melting and dissolution of them into their Aether without Recollection or Resurrction 2. At the same instant therefore of the Virgin Mary's Conception the Word in or of the second Principle was by the Vehicle or Medium of the Holy Element Conceived in the Light of her Life taking her's viz. our Eternal Human Soul and Spirit or Light generated out of the Souls Essences and both Soul and Spirit became as one in an Eternal Band with the Word like as the Masculine and Feminine Tinctures unite in ordinary Conceptions 3. In the same moment also by the genuine Right of Nature as the Divine Lubet of the two Principles breath out the third Principle attracting the Powers thereof for their manifestation and by the same immutable Law as by which common Fire attracts Air did This Holy Divine Conception call to it the Astral Powers and Spirit and those for their Associates brought as their house and clothing the four Elements being of the like necessity as the Body of a living Creature follows the Head Thus the Word became Flesh yet as incomprehensible not only to the Flesh but also to the fallen Humane Nature as the Eternal Soul is to the Astral or as the Astral Spirit is to the dead Earth 4 But as truely as the Eternal Humane Soul and Spirit the Tincture the Astral Soul the Animal Spirits and Sences and the Elementary Body or Bulk compose and form one Man so truely did the Word of the Almighty Son of God the Virgin of Gods Wisdom the disappeared Image of the Heavenly Humanity assume and unite with Mans Humane Soul Spirit and Tincture enter also into the Astral Vigor and Powers also enter and assume the Elementary Flesh and consecrat circumcise and hallow them and thus become one perfect compleat person God and Man 5. The decay of the Lungs is hard to be restored because applications thither are obstructed their Porter so curiously guards the entrance as that Air only may have admission wherefore the Wall is sometimes broken by Inscition to send injections to the part impaired tho' with great hazard But our Almighty Restorer hath entred the whole Man every crevice and secret of Soul and Body is all Superficies an open Field at Noon day to the Omniscience of gracious Love 6. When my dull Spirits a little penetrate this incomprehensible condescention my powers yield up themselves prostrate tremble and flame my Soul finds himself as one living among the dead it hath something to say and do which it wants apt Organs to express and prosecute And if my obscure Soul find himself unequally yoaked what a stoop did Infinite Goodness make to bear our griefs and take on him the chastisement of our peace be as a Lamb dumb before the Shearers Yea under the Merciless Murtherers and Tormentors pour out his Soul He hid not his sweet Face from shame and spitting that by his stripes we his cruel Enemies might be healed Q. 107. Wherefore would God became Man could he not forgive Man his Sins without becoming Man A. The Minds of Men have been very apt to err about the Doctrine of forgiving sin thinking it to be like verbal Remissions among Men or at a Bar of Judgment 1. One party pretend possession of the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven by succession to Peter who himself had no promise of them but as he was one of the Apostles which when it was performed was to him and the rest alike Yet still that Party plead prescription and saying a form of words like a Charm great sinners are told they are pardoned yet probably by such who are often greater sinners than themselves 2. Another party less gross in words yet no less remiss in Practice and Conversation expect pardon of an Age of sins by a Death-bed pretended sorrow and words of hope and confidence in the Merit of the Lord Jesus without any conformity all their Life to his Death and Resurrection 3. Had the putting sinful Man into a Blessed state been so easie Would the only begotten Son of God have taken our disorder'd Souls and vile bestial Bodies born the Curse fulfilled all Righteousness encountred and been slain by Death a shameful death passed through a Sea of streights grief and pain exerted a Series of miraculous power No No. 4. Man was estranged from God had lost his noble Image was partly a Devil and partly a Beast it was then absolutely necessary he who alone was mighty to save should do all he did Or Man was past any help and all hope of Restoration and Pardon 5. Therefore did God become Man the Word was made Flesh to appease the wrath of the forms of the first principle by inkindling Divine Light in them therewith also was Mans Spirit which was like a Phantasm or like a foolish Night Fire inflamed with Sacred Love and Mans Astral and Elementary parts were Tinctur'd into a due Subjection to his more noble part as they to the Divine 6. Thus the great Captain entred through Death to break the Gates of it restoring the Virgin Image in our Humanity of himself he saith John 17. 19. And for their sakes sanctifie I my self that they also may be sanctified The pardon of sin produceth a mortifying of self a rising in a new Life a sacrificing every Lust a Love sickness to the Lord a War with the Enemies a Heart broken and melted a new tender one receiv'd this is true Gospel forgiveness Q. 108. How was the uniting of the Deity and Humanity in this becoming Man A. 1. God Created Adam an Image of the whole three principles both first and third fully illustrated by the holy second principle yet was his very third principle of the holy Paradisical Element wherein was the pure modest chaste Virgin of Divine Wisdom vouchsafed to Man as his Bride But neither is the Virgin holy Element nor Paradise God but the Virgin is the Tincture of the Light and the holy Element the Flesh and Blood of Christ whence was Adam and the Angels 2. These things foreknown way is made to answer the Divine secret sought after in this Question and requireth the Eyes of all the three principles as they stand in the
Spiritual World which are open in some measure in all the humble Holy Ones but to others tho great Proficients in Knowledge if of Old Adam only I am dumb and these things are idle Speculations they are lockt bolted sealed 3. But to the Children of the Kingdom it is answer'd The Deity united it self to the Humanity in the holy part of the Humanity in every of the three principles that is in the holy Element where his third principle in his Creation stood else could he not have rul'd over the siderial had he not been in their Root for they but Imaged the powers of the holy Element and Eternal Nature or great Mystery 4. We are not to be so ignorant as to suppose the Deity took into union our Bestial part for we see in transmutation of Metals the dross or rust is not affected with the Tincture The regenerate new Man feels while we are present in the Body we are absent from the Lord. 5. The Infinite Deity or Heart of God the second principle of Love createth nothing being himself the end of nature viz. as out of himself for he is the perfect Summit of all yet doth comprehend all penetrate all only the perverse will blindfolds it self 6. But tho' the holy Love principle or Deity createth nothing As neither doth the outward Sun generate any substance out of its own pure Body but furthereth pre-existent Matter Yet because Man had estranged himself both from the holy Element and Virgin of purity who was his Image being the Tincture of the Light as himself was the express Image of the Father therefore did the for ever Blessed Deity to the Eternal Admiration of humane Nature and of the Angelical World Unite himself in the holy Element which is his Heavenly Flesh and Blood and in the Virgin of Wisdom the Spouse of the Soul unto miserable fallen blind distressed Humane Nature 7. Hereby meekening the rage and disorder of the darkned Soul illuminating the unsetled Spirit and Understanding and Tincturing the very Siderial Soul or Astral Spirit or Man Extending also his Abyss of Infinite Grace to the very Elementary Body As Aaron's precious Oyl ran down to the Hem of his Vesture Q. 109. How did Christ become Born of Mary to this World without prejudice to her Virginity How could she after the Birth remain still a Virgin A. 1. This pure Virgin Conception may shew all who are not wilfully blind what Adam's exchange of pure Virgin Love and Modesty for Lust in the divided properties was I refer to the 54. 61 62 63 and 65. Answers studiously shunning recitals of things written in any of them how pertinent soever hereunto 2. The Virginity of Mary remained intire after the Conception and Birth of the Lord 1. For it may be considered that this most admirable condescention was a work begun and perfected by Infinite Divine Love on the one part and holy awe and profound humility on the other more above wanton Lust than do the Coelestial Rays excel the foul Kitchen Fire in purity 3. Obscurely figur'd by some eminently holy Men who were the Children of Old Age such as Isaac and others after long barrenness So was Joseph given to Rachel and others after Wrestling with God by Prayer as Samuel to Hanna And John the Baptist given to Elizabeth who seemed to be proverbially call'd Barren Now in the holy Parents of such the wantonness of Fleshly Lust was withered which in the Virgin Mary had not been excited 4. Let it be considered that the access of Increase of Homogeneous Vertue and Power doth not nor can weaken impair or lessen the vigour of the property it hath as 1. In a House where burns a common Fire the hot Sun and Season makes the heat more ardent tho' that Fire less penetrating and scalding Or 2. Into a Room where burns a blinking Candle or other small Light a Beam of the Sun entring makes the place more lustrous tho' that faint Light less luminous And 3. Pure Water poured into Water somewhat foul makes it not less but more pure 5. Thus the holy Element feeding the Life of Maries regenerated Soul and in the same pure Element the Virgin of Gods Wisdom being the Tincture of the Light and Spouse of Jesus Christ. In the same pure Element with that pure Virginity of Gods Wisdom the Infinite holy second principle the Son of God took for an Eternal propriety the Essences of Maries Humanity and did of all form one Divine and Humane Holy One Holy Thing Holy Child c. And all this could no more detract or impeach her Virginity than the Elixir put into common Wine or Water can debase and debilitate it and decline it towards the disesteem and inefficacy of common cold Water Q. 110. Why did Christ walk or converse Thirty years upon the Earth before he took or entred upon his Office Why did he increase in Age and Favour with God and Man seeing he is God himself and needed no growing or increasing A. 1. Infinite Wisdom saw Thirty years neither more nor less than necessary wherein compleat obedience might actually be rendered by the second Adam to all the parts of the Righteous Law broken by the first and all this before the Lord took his Office 2. For in these Thirty years the ten forms of Fire in the active Life signified by the ten Generations beginning in Sem and ending in Abraham had their peâ—fect work three times because as Man had miserably estranged his Life forms by actual Transgression in every of the three principles So accordingly did the Son of God who was now also the Son of Man graciously travel with his which were our Lifes forms and in and through all the three principles by the several steps of the ten forms of Fire in the active Liâ—e 3. Bringing thereby the first second and third principles which were stray'd from the will of the liberty as the first of the ten was figured by Sem and introduced the Humanity through the desiring anguish and all the rest into the tenth that is into the Holy Flesh and Paradisical or Angelical World figur'd by Abraham 4. Thus Joseph the Type of this Glorious Thirty years wherein were fulfilled all Righteousness endured Bondage and a Series of Sorrow and when he was Thirty years old stood before Pharaoh and was put into Office next unto him 5. David also another Type of this after passing many tiring hardships and almost invincible difficulties and hazards was at the same Age of Thirty years Crowned King This is represented again by David's Thirty Worthies and three more Honourable than the rest figure the years after the Lord took his Office 6. Noah's Ark and Solomon's Temple were each Thirty Cubits high pointing us these Thirty years Now for answer to the second part of the Question why Christ did increase in Age and Favour with God and Man c. 7. This signifies and points out to us his
process and passing from one part of the Law of Righteousness which he fulfilled into another to fulfil that as the Ark was gradually Built and the Temple erected Cubit after Cubit 8. Joseph and David had first a youthful privacy and then severe figures given them to bear sometimes to be as it were given up and lost and again passing that almost swallowed up of another Thus also is the Christian taught to add unto Faith Patience Experience c. 9. The Lords process from state to state is the Epitomy of the Birth of the Eternal Powers the liberty of the will floweth into a desiring thence into sharp attracting thence into anguish thence into the Eternal Nature c. through all the forms of Fire to the 10th or Crown and punctum of Sol. 10. As out of the Anguishes of the first principle is generated the love and joy of the second which the Christian feels and the searching mind sees in every very outward power Now for that the subsequent Questions will lead to inquire into the admirable process of the Lords humbling and emptying himself What is written may suffice to this answer Q. 111. Why did Christ suffer himself to be Baptized by John with Water whereas he himself was both the Baptism and Baptizer which should Baptize with the Holy Ghost A. This Question made John the Baptist adding I have need to be Baptized of thee to which the Lord answered Suffer it to be so now for thus it becometh us to fulfil all Righteousness for the Lord of the Law by taking Mans fallen Nature on him having so far made himself subject to it as that he must fulfil it and that thereby he might introduce into the Humanity a suitable will of walking agreeably to it found Baptism part of that Righteousness 2. And yet in Moses according to the Letter yea until John is no mention of it in express words only the Apostle makes this Baptism to be meant by their passing through the Red Sea and under the Cloud 3. Christ Jesus by taking on him fallen Mans Nature took on him that which stood and consisted in and of all the three principles and every of the three principles in the fain Adam were depraved standing in need of Baptism 4. The first principle or Soul stood in need of the Baptism of Repentance from dead works for Mans Soul had stray'd imaging in it the dead Out-birth which is dead to it The second needed the Baptism of the Holy Ghost working Faith in or towards God which was it John meant when he said I have need to be Baptized of thee The third or Aâ—â—ral and Elementary Man of the Out-birth needed the outward Baptism which outward is as a Medium to the other 5. And we find all three in one Breath orderly by the Author to the Hebrews viz. not laying again c. 1. Repentance from dead Works 2. Faith towards God 3. The Doctrine of Baptisms thus stand the principles in the regenerate Man 6. And as the Sea was the Instrument to cover the Enemy for his destruction and the Cloud cover'd the Israelites for their defence so the outward Baptism shews us the burying of the old Man and the washing and arising of the new Man 7. In the first sence we are defended from the oppressing disorders of the old Man shut up in the first principle and in the other we are restored by the rising of the second principle in the new Man which is the first Resurrection teaching the Song of Moses and of the Lamb. 8. And tho' the siderial Man comprehend not what is done to it yet seeing it shared in the disobedience it is buried by the Baptism of Water Seeing also it shall share in the Resurrection and Eternal Salvation it must be washed in Baptism 9. Thus see we why Christ suffered himself to be Baptized with Water as in the Question is demanded also why all his Servants under the Evangelical Administration are to do it not only as a Litteral but also as a Foundation Duty Q. 112. Wherefore must Christ after his Baptism he tempted Forty days in the Wilderness What doth it mean that a God-man should be tempted And why must the Devil tempt him before he began his Works of Wonder A. 1. Adam was tempted and fell in it and his fâ—ll open'd a Door in the Humane Nature through which the Tempter entreth for his first principle is drawn by the Forms whereof it is compounded into an adverse will against the meekness and resignation so that the Tempter entring the breach widens it And the third principle which Man Imageth in his Soul is the Kingdom whereof the Prince of Darkness is a God 2. The Devil useth the passive powers of the out-world in themselves good to his direful Machinations and other powers which by their being separate and in that respect in themselves evil are as Tools ready made wherewith to exercise as far as his Chain reacheth fatal designs to bring Tragedies on Places and Persons 3. And all Men whose Intellects the remains of their second principle are confin'd in the limits either of their disorder'd first or third principles how politick speculatively penetrating seemingly wise or rigorously superstitious soever are all yet Vassals Drudges and Ear-bor'd Slaves to the wicked one at his will 4. But where ingenious Nature simply follows its own dictates as undebauched Childhood or Youth that Intellect is little serviceable to the Hellish powers even as the outward Sun and Moon are little useful to them Tho' at the same time the Spring that feeds that ingenuity derives from the first not from the new Man and second Adam or Regeneration nor is its Life from the Divine Light 5. It is also too manifest that the Children of the day in whom Christ is formed being immur'd in Bestial Flesh propagated by Apostate sinful Man and Woman and having the Tincture of their Souls impaired lye open to the Tempter and have great necessity of Divine aid continually to humble themselves pray fast watch sight strive wrestle and use all diligence left they enter into Temptation 6. Now the Lord Jesus taking the Humane Nature on him did undergo the evil and bear the load of Temptation being one eminent part of his process for us but the Tempter not seeing the purity of his Conception being quite another principle too deep by far for him might conceive hope of like success as he had against Eve who was a kind of Virgin and the Lord being made of a Virgin But the Lord saith the Tempter cometh but hath nothing in me 7. Now that the process of Temptation should succeed the Baptism of the Lord teacheth us that the New Man's Advances in the Way of Obedience is a time of holy fear care and humbling the Soul it being the more not the less liable to various multiplyed terrible Temptations and in that the Lord was tempted he is able to succour them that are Tempted
tâ—e Humane Soul as it was deriv'd from Mary was finite yet as he was conceived by the seminal substance of the Holy Ghost it was Infinite being wholly so united to the Infinity 7. Behold and sink down and drown thy self Oh my Soul in the sweet Ocean of this free Master piece of Matchless love see the heighth depth length and breadth Know what passeth knowledge Conception Comprehension Make thy Heart the Footstool of it thy Soul a Sacrifice to it thy Spirit the amazed Witness of it thy Mind and Thoughts the Waiters on it thy Tongue and Pen the Trumpet of it Let Heaven and Earth adore it let Time and Eternity record it let Hell and the Children of Pride tremble at it but let the humble Man and broken Bones Inherit Inhabit and Rejoice in it for ever Q. 128. Why did some convert and turn again when they saw what was done at the dying of Christ And the High-Priests not Why must they be blind and hardened as to this Work A. 1. By the High-Priests are meant him that was such and those Rulers of most Eminence assisting and concurring with him This Question is double viz. Why some did convert And why such as the High Priests c. did not That some did as the Centurion c. Matth. 27. â—4 seeing that which was done feared greatly saying Truely this was the Son of God Luke 2â— 47. 4â— And Luke records That the Centurion and all the people seeing c. Glorified God and all the people smote their Breasts and departed 2. For their dark Centre was terrified the stirred by remorse and compassion with and unto so patient and innocent a Lamb and that stirring moving on by conviction to great grief sorrow and mourning begat love and the love enkindled the holy Light of the second Divine principle of which number it 's said Longinus was who with his Spear pierced the Lords blessed side 3. But in the High-Priests c. The dark Zeal had like Fire drunk up the meek Water of Tenderness and Compassion so that the Light could not enkindle but they remain'd a dark Fire For it is manifest they by their impetuous Lusting proud grasping for Grandeur and Rule and their griping after heaping up abundance of the outward principle had by Covetousness like greedy Dogs or Swine formed their very Souls according to the four Auguishes of the first dark Hellish Impression 4. As Antichrist also whose Forerunners and Antitype these were hath done and still doth Therefore to distinguish a resolv'd hardened Persecutor from the Creaturely Devils is thus to be done that the persecuting Man hath on him the Bestial part of the Out-birth for mitigation which is a Door through which it is possible Grace may enter unless the impardonable sin hath judicially wholly shut him up 5. But the mitigating third principle excepted viz. the worst part of it the Antichristian Spirited-Man having shut out the second principle the Evil Angels and he are in one and the self-same principle 6. It is also certain that the Antichrist sometimes call'd the Whore sometimes Babylon sometimes the Mystery of Iniquity and Man of Sin is as such incureable and irrecoverable for it is an Enmity against Love and Meekness The Art of Physick gives that Disease for Incureable which is grounded on the Constitution the Disease of Antichrist is such and therefore Incureable for he is compos'd of the Enmity of the four forms of the first principle and is Enmity in the Abstract against the Divine Kingdom of Humility Meekness Love Peace and Divine Light and Joy Q. 129. What was Christs going to Hell where he overcame Death and the Devil A. 1. Great is Mans Misery on Earth by reason of wilful blindness When we hear of Christs going to Hell or overcoming Death and the Devil there we blindly grope with our Conceits imagining in our Reason a local motion to a place far off But that it may be plainly told what Christs going to Hell was it must first be orderly said 1. What Hell is and where Which is referr'd to the 17th Answer the 19 20 21 22 23 verses 2. What the Conquering Captain Christ is that Vanquished all the Devils every where It is answered It was Christ as he had made himself a Creature for his Body as a Creature is the whole holy pure Element which comprizeth this whole World The holy Body hath Heavenly Flesh and Blood and Water of Eternal Life which feedeth the Faithful Soul at the Lords Table 2. Anâ— tho' it comprizeth this World Heaven Paradise and the Angelical World yet is a Creature but such a Creature as can be every where in the Deity for unto this Creature of Heavenly substantiality hath the Almighty Son of God espoused himself as a Body to remain in Eternity as in the time the Sun doth unto the Moon as in his own Body In every part of which Body the Trinity is always manifest Objection 3. But this crosseth the received Divinity which assigns ubiquity to be the peculiar distinction of the Creator from the Creature Also an imposing upon the Senses that one Creature is at London and at Quinsay at the same moment of time a thing denied to be in the Sphere of an Angel whose Wings are only illustrations of his almost instantaneous local motion implying he cannot be in two places at once Answer 4. The least divisible Body requires place and space and magnitude is the uniting of two or more divisibles 1. My Foot is not where my Head is but I am where either of them is 2. If my Head only is in the Air my Body only in the Water my Feet only in the Earth under Water yet I am in every of these at once 3. My Hand is at the Heâ—m my Eye on the Star my Heart with my God then am I at once in two Worlds 4. Again my Elementary and Sensual Man is in pain my Siderial Man in care the unmortified properties of my Eternal first Principle or old Man or Root of the Soul in much stubbornness anxiety and frowardness my regenerate new Man or humble meekened Spirit is rejoicing under the Cross in hope of Eternal Blessedness Yet am I but one little poor Creature tho' I am at once in one Visible and three Invisible Worlds 5. Now tho' what the new Man sees or feels hath or hopes for meets with resistance in the unmortified part of the first principle or earthy Vessel yet is it not so in Divine Bodies of Angels or perfected Spirits Who all by prevalence of their consonance and uninterrupted holy will have their Heterogeneous parts swallow'd up by their lustrous Harmony 6. All these things penetrated and pondered shall our straitned Souls confine the Immense Heavenly Humanity of the Lord Jesus Christ For his becoming Man or Incarnation wherein he assumed our darkened Souls uniting them with the Divine Virgin of Wisdom as one Creature in himself did not straâ—ten lessen
Jews believed it not and too many at this day oppose it because they misunderstand that and other Divine Truths so that may still be the Lamentation My People perish for want of knowledge They that said in the Apostles days the Resurrection is past already were not perhaps aware that they overthrew the Faith of some it being the same as if they had said there was no Resurrection Object Some may say Man having a visible palpable elementary Body and an invisible astral Spirit or Soul Author of the five Senses at least that acts the Organs neither of those parts can share in the Resurrection for the Stars shall fall and the Elements dissolve Let them tell me too our Flesh is Grass Dust we are of the Earth earthy and like the Beast that perisheth If therefore the Syderial Root and four Elements return into their Aether can the Products thence subsist his Body being dependant on a transient Principle whereof 't is compounded With what Body therefore shall he arise A. 1. 8. Christ had a visible palpable Body as ours from the astral World and four Elements though by reason of his being begotten of the Holy Ghost was infinitely Superior and more Noble yet in his Resurrection was his Elementary also raised to Immortality and Glory 9. The Apostle saith If the Dead rise not 1. Then Christ is not raised 2. Your Faith is vain 3. Ye are yet in your Sins 4. Our Preaching is vain 5. We are found false Witnesses 6 Those that sleep in Christ are perished 7. Our hope is vain 8. We of all men are most miserable But therefore that Christ is risen and become the first fruits of them that slept A. 2. If our Body as far degenerate as it is become had no higher Extraction than barely the astral World and four Elements it might have no other Resurrection or Perpetuity but be as the Beast But how then was it to have endured to Eternity had not Sin broken it It had therefore its Root in the Eternal spiritual World whereof the outward World and the Spirit thereof viz. The Spirit of the great World are a figure and Representation A. 3. 11. It is relatively Eternal being United to the Eternal Soul joyned to the Holy Body it obeyeth and beareth suffereth and doth the Holy Will of God as the Souls Instrument and Companion And the wicked Souls direful confederate in all their black Machinations beastly selfish Maxims and fordid Prostitutions and therefore in both must have a Resurrection to receive according to their Works 12. But the Bodies of wicked People are as a ready prepared Engine whose every part is curiously composed by Exquisite symmetry liberally oyl'd to whirl as an Automatae down a steep Mountain whil'st the Bodies of holy Souls are as a Bullock unaccustomed to the Yoak or a lazy Ass to struggle through a narrow deep way with a leaden load up a weary heighth So that look how much of extraordinary Assistance or rather violent Inducement the Evil man's Body is to his Soul so much perplexing Impediment hath the regenerate Child from his Body 13. Infidelity suggests so many Improbabilities as may make one Impossibility of the Resurrection to which is opposed Omnipotence Shall that Infinite Power whose Hand gives Being to every thing and World from the Angelical Tâ—rones to the vile Insect and Minute-parts of every pile of Grass be insufficient to rally Man's dissever'd Limbs number the Hairs and not the Members record all Mens Actions Words Thoughts and forget the whole Bulk and Fabrick 14. As to the last part of the Objection with what Body shall they rise To this the Apostle replies Thou Fool that which thou sowest is not quicken'd except it die and the Body which shall be viz. not the self same Grain but the self-same Kind riseth be it Wheat or any other and the self-same Tincture in the Crop as was in the Seed only our Corruption Dishonour and Weakness is changed into Incorruption Glory and Power 15 The Sons of Wisdom can see the Transmutation of Metals The Naturalist the death dissolution and reforming and vivifying of Craw-fish The curious Observer the Transmigration of the Silk Worm Every one that kindles a fire the triumph of the flame on change of the Accidents of the Fuel The Physitian the consent of Bodies and Parts by sympathy and of Actives and Passives Who sees not the Loadstone single out one filing of Steel from a heap of Sand. The Plowman and Gardener see out of the dark Earth arise Corn Fruits Flowers of other colour odour taste c. than the Earth yet acknowledge they the Earth hath all the Vertues Properties and Powers of them obscurely in it 16. Why then should it seem impossible that He that raised up Jesus Christ from the Dead should be able to quicken our Mortal Bodies though literally mortified when Death shall be swallow'd up of Victory as saith the Prophet Thy dead Men shall live together with my dead Body shall they arise Awake and sing you that dwell in the dust for thy dew shall be as the dew of Herbs c. Q. 135. What manner of Door hath Christ through Death opened in our Humanity in the Anger and Righteousness of God where by we may enter into God How is that done A. 1. As it is not the Wind abroad but that in the Earth that causeth Earthquakes so neither could Man's mortal inward Wound be cured by outward Applications for because Man was become inwardly a Hell to himself and outwardly lock'd up in the Curse of the Out-birth wherein he had secluded and shut up himself from the Divine Light as in the 69th Answer is discoursed 2. It was therefore past all Remedy unless Heaven would mercifully introduce it self into the Soul in the light of his Life Then did the gracious Principle of Love by bringing the Eternal Virgin back into the lockâ— up Humanity become a Saviour Like as the Fiat or speaking Word did in the Beginning by the Light compose Order amongst the Confusions of the Properties of the Chaos So the Lord of the Light-Holy-World came into the averâ—ed Will of the Humanity and there implanted it self as a Tincture being Himself the Omnipotence of the Kingdom of Divine Love into the Anger and severe Righteousness of God in Man 3. Thus came it into Man's enraged first Principle like sweet Oyl or Incense into a dark hungry fire which raiseth it into a Radiant sweet flame and Iustre As when the Humane Intellect returned into Nebuchadnezzar his bestial Image was exalted So when the Divine dear Love embraceth and is enkindled in Man's angry fierceness it potently attracts by assimilation some Divine Breathings and makes impressions of it self As in Esau at his meeting Jacob. 4. The Door by which the Soul goeth into God is opened as Jacob by yielding up himself passed through a Death appeasing Esau for by this the Soul 's bolted and barred-up Door is unshut and set
wide open So that in the resignation it lives one Life with Christ in God and hath its passage through one Death with Christ to God and is in the Resurrection thus begun in one Spirit by the Eternal Spirit the heavenly Flesh and Blood or Humanity of Christ is its Food it is God's Body or Christ's Body the pure Element and Virgin of Wisdom and Modesty is his Companion 5. For thus his violent griping Astringency is sated by the Lord 's infinite giving yielding Power and Vertue this causeth him instead of violent Attraction to be like a water'd Garden breathing out his sweet Odours His Anger and Rage is foil'd and kill'd by calm serene Meekness Humility Patience and Sweetness His Envy by Love which grows to a kind of Emulation to give if it were possible more than any Saint or Angel yea as much if he could to God and for God as he receives from him 6. This Soul loseth himself for he is not his own but in an excellent sence is besides himself as the Brethren of the dear Jesus said of him and would have laid hands on him This Door thus opened gives such access that the Soul once and ever and once for all gives all without the least reserve and so hath nothing and yet then and for ever receives all and hath all for losing his own poor narrow miserable beggerly all he finds himself rich with Eternal fulness which still he surrenders with deepest Humility 7. But how can words export what the Soul cannot contain or broken Letters express what a broken Heart breaketh and melteth in the Contemplation of How can the shallow brutish outward Man fathom what the New and Spiritual Man is swallowed up with These things are the matter at the time of Sacrifice but what it is always the Hour of Prayer it is always the time of Sacrifice in this Temple Amen Q. 136. What doth the Pilgrimage or Journey of the two Disciples from Jerusalem to Emaus signifie where they complained in Anxiety for their Master and yet Christ walked among them and enquired of them and taught them and yet they knew him not A. 1. This Journey is fitly compared to that of Hagar who by leaving her Mistriss Sarah was in great Anxiety and then comforted and instructed by the Angel and shew'd the Well Lahairoy and that both with respect to Hagar whose hope concerning her only Son was like to the over-whelming sorrow of these two Disciples their only hope being on the Lord's restoring the Kingdom was reduced to a great degree of despair distrust and offence at their fail'd hopes Also with respect to the Angel appearing to Hagar at the needful time of her despair and which is the first recorded to have appeared So is this at as needful a time and on a most important Exigent of Despair and the first day of the Lord's Resurrection 2. And now founding the Discourse by alluding to this Parallel it will be obvious what signification this Historical Occurrence hath viz. That as Hagar figured the state of Bondage as did Mount Sinai which our Apostle teacheth us were an Alâ—egory Only by the way it may be noted had not so good Authority explain'd it thus but that the self same Exposition had been made of it by â— Modern Pen though guided in some measure by the same Spirit our letter Wise men would probably have call'd it Enthusiaâ—m So doth this Journey of the two Disciples from Jerusalem to Emaus sigâ—â—fie the 〈◊〉 of a 〈◊〉 quitting Divine faithful waiting on God in any obscure Dispensation when the Providences are too deep and high for their faint feeble dull disquisition and reach then they depart from Abraham's abounding stedfastness of precious Faith to Hagar's dry Bottle of Reason but like Cleopas in Anguish say we trusted this Man should have redeemed Israel viz. this or that should or should not have been c. implâ—ing their trust is expiring 3. The Bridegroom was taken from them now was the day of fasting and heaviness the Shepherd was smitten now were they scattered This was the hour of the power of Darkness such as God's Children usually meet with esâ—ecially the beginners who having tasted a time of love think presently to have all they hope for Dreaming of the Journeys end at first setting out when conâ—rariwise their Mr. is taken from their head inward or outward Temptations perhaps both like a Torrent sweep them downward 4. Then are they apt and usually do let go the exercise of the Divine Magia where Faith and Love support each other and betake them to the Astraâ— Magia their own Reason where in disconsolate anxiety they shew their Hope is giving up the Ghost 5. The Lord 's joyning himself unto them signifies such a time of recollection as is a day neither dark nor light they are seen and that in mercy but their infidelity with-holds them from seeing It is neither Day nor Night their Understanding outruns their Eyes their Hearts burn but till farther discovery their fire gives little light but in the Evening it shall be light it was so with them viz. when our Reason the Issue and Child of the third Principle doth set as when their Evening was come then the true Eternal Light in Jesus discovers it self breaking the heavenly Bread and the same hour they return to Jerusalem 6. But let all such offended poor Disciples know the Lord may be with them while they are surrounded with Laments let them stay for he will not tarry long but if they wholly depart they may lye down sadly 60 Furlongs from Jerusalem as is too grievously to be seen in the Potent Eastern Nations who are lain down under the Doctrine of Siderial Reason their Regulation of the third Principle As far also as the Western World is with-held by Antichristian Maxims they feed upon Ashes the â—rash and fictitious Formula's of the same third Principle joyn'd with the cruel Properties of the first 7. And lastly It must be noted that by the Lord 's appearing to them in their anxious state is sigâ—ified the natural Production of Divine Power and Glory out of the anxious wheel the struggling of the four mighty Forms of the first Principle as out of its natural Root or Centre More might be said but none will deny that which is said to be according to the Analogy of Faith Q. 137. Why did Christ after his Resurrection first appear to a Woman and not to his Disciples A. 1. More generally 1. To shew his Prime and Particular regard to a Soul excelling in Love to God did he first shew himself to Mary Magdalen to whom much had been forgiven therefore she loved much And 2. it was to proceeâ— in God's usual Method who standeth not in need of the Wisdom Ability and Excellency of Men to work his Designs but doth it for and in Babes and by them to and for others 3. Again to give preference to the Holy Zeal and Fervour which
of the quenching of Wrath with Love he sitteth in the Throne and is himself the Reconciliation Q. Is it askt what is the Kingdom City Palace or Seat whither he ascended and where he is A. 3. He is himself the Seat Palace City and Kingdom Q. Is it askt how can this be intelligible to Mortals living in Houses of Clay A. What is and where are the Bounds in the outward World of the Light The shining Sun is its own Palace and Throne it also is in the whole Deep in the several Elements and Concrets as far as any thing is capable of it yet is it but a Figure or Representation of the true Eternal Son Q. It is said concerning his visible circumscriptive Body which rose again and was seen by his Disciples on Earth during his Forty days converse whom the Disciples saw ascend and of whom the two Men in shining Garments spake that he should in like manner descend Where is that Body A. 4. It is answered it is in its own Eternal Throne But it is to be considered if we in our astral Man can view in our Intellect the whole Globe of Earth and Seas and the whole Deep of the third Principle And were our more noble part freed from the Images our Syderial Spirit frameth what a view could it take of the Principles and Fountain Spirits whence it all sprung especially that which it lives in and delights in as how much of the Eternal World may a glorified Spirit know for the Child knows and seeth his Parents and the Lords very outward Body was Begotten of the Holy Ghost as Masculine Seed 5. If therefore such a poor finite Creature as Man the lower sort of Intellectuals who is the thing formed or building can mount so high and apprehend so much Whither cannot he ascend what cannot he do and comprehend who being Conceived of the Holy Ghost is the Builder of the House Who tho' he humbled himself to the form of a Servant and ascended as such to shew he was our Brother yet is Lord of all and in his Heavenly Humanity is not exclusible of place as Eternity is not excluded out of time Q. 142. What signifie the two Men in Shining Garments who said Ye Men of Galilee why look ye up after him This Jesus who is taken from you to Heaven will come a-again as you have seen him ascend or go into Heaven A. 1. Moses saith Out of the Mouth of Two Witnesses shall every Truth be established And the Lord saith if he will not hear thee take with thee one or two more Thus in the Temple were two Cherubims stretching out their two Wings and the Lord sent out his Disciples two and two 2. The signification of all which is that when the first Adam by not acting his Powers caused the dividing the Two Tinctures into distinct Male and Female which should have remained but one Error and Falshood soon crept in for the Two Tinctures were neither of them true but Deceit introduced it self into both because the true Virginity disappeared 3. And the Two Tinctures were united only in the second Adam to bear one Voice or Testimony for he Married the Humane Soul to Virgin Sophia Thus the two Men in shining Garments bear but one Testimony Hence was it that in Sacrificing of Fowl the Male and his Female made but one Offering 4. Also thus as the Lord who was then taken up into Heaven shall in like manner return again so the holy pure Virgin Sophia the Wisdom of God and Tincture of the Light who left the Humane Fire Soul of Adam and withdrew from him into her own Heaven But by the Incarnation of the second Adam the same Eternal Virginity came down and returned again to the Humane Soul of us poor unworthy miserable Men. Q. 143. Why must the Disciples of Christ yet wait ten days for his Ascention for the sending of the Holy Ghost Why was not that done instantly Here begins the Eighth Grand Distribution A. 1. It was 1. To compleat the Antitype being the time pointed at by the Feast of Weeks which Feast of Weeks is commanded several times viz. from the Morrow after the Sabbath of the Passover reckon seven Sabbaths is 49 and 1 is 50 or the Feast of Pentecost from the Lords Resurrection At the end of Forty days the Lord ascended and the Disciples were to wait at Jerusalem till the coming of the Holy Ghost which was ten days after The ten days to make up the Feast of Weeks was that they might be a secondary illustration whereto the seventh day or weekly Sabbath is suited 2. Nine of these ten days points at the whole course of the Race of a Christian in this World and the tenth is the Crown Summit or Perfection As the nine first forms of Fire are Crowned with the Heavenly Birth of the Paradisical Earth and Water of Life in the holy World which is obtained by adding thereunto the tenth form 3. This is figur'd by the nine Generations beginning with Seâ— and Abraham is the tenth in whose Seed cometh the Blessing upon all In like manner find we Angels Ministring to Christs Incarnation nine times and the two at his Ascention was the tenth See the first Verse of the 133 Answer So there were ten Lepers cleansed but one only returning with thanks it is said where are the nine Thus was the tenth day of their waiting the day of the gracious and glorious coming down of the Holy Ghost Q. 144. What is this that the Disciples must wait and continue together till the Holy Ghost came A. 1. Will any say it was for their outward safety 't is true obedience is the safe path But this was of its own Nature most hazardous against Jacob's method who divided his Family and Substance to preserve some but this keeping them together was as to Mans Judgment an exposing them to danger for first an Assembly is less secret than one also more obnoxious to the Jealousie of evil Eyes From the consequence whereof they had no outward defence of their own or Followers or the People which somewhat swayed with the Priests c. in their time of rage against the Lord whereas they were not entered so far into their Ministry as might promise popular respect Therefore their being together might be deemed by the Bloody Persecutors of the Lord a fit season at once to extirpate the Lords Sacred Embassy and Embassadors 2. Their waiting and continuing together was therefore an Eminent Touchstone of pure Love and incomparable Faith 1. In respect of their Work which was to witness what the Lord was Crucified for acknowledging viz. that himself was the Son of God 3. 2. In respect of the place Jerusalem the stage where the Shepherd was smitten where the Murtherers were Rulers whose Streets lately Consecrated with the holy Lord's walks Miracles and Heavenly Doctrines The Temple where he had often spoken like God not like Man Where was a
Garden which he had often frequented The Judgment Hall where he had been reviled crown'd with Thorns mocked scourged and condemned Also Calvary where they mercilesly crucified Mercy it self remained all Monuments of the greatest Love and Patience and extream Malice and ferine Cruelty In this City which should have worn Sackcloth with these sad Objects and under these Rulers were they to dwell and be confined 4. 3. With respect to the time being that of the Bridegrooms being taken from them of their having Tribulation ten days the time when their Enemies were Flesht by having their Hands Embrewed in the Blood of the Lord Jesus As cruel wild Beasts tasting the Blood of their prey and the time before descending of power from on high to revive them 5 But they must wait on this service in this place at this time signifying to us that the time of the Christians Life is the exercise of Faith Obedience and Trial of the sincerity of Love a time of beholding sad Objects as was this of theirs of hearing sinful sounds the being harassed by Oppressive Rulers converse with or amongst malicious ensnaring dangerous Enemies inward Terrors and Tempests and outward Storms and Outrages from the powers of the dark World 6. So that the distressed Soul can find no succour or guidance from the Imaged Powers of the outward Astral World but must sink down from them and constantly wait the Breathings of the true speaking Light World left if the outward Magia be our level design and home the dark Magus do by it insinuate into us and we thereby form the will of the Spirit of this World into our Eternal Souls which neither can â—â—ed them cloth them nor guide them but if thus they proceed till the four Elements fall off they shall find themselves miserably cheated This waiting of the Apostles directs us therefore to wait for the Whispers of the Word behind us so call'd we having gone out from it and turn'd our Backs on it Q. 145. What is the Feast of Pentecost How was the shedding or pouring forth of the Holy Ghost effected And how did the Bands of the Tongues of the Lords Disciples become unloosed A. 1. Our Fall in Adam brought us from the Paradisical Feasting to the toilsom Life to a state affording no other Food for the four properties of our first Principle which was the Centre of the Soul but the third Principle Which is rightly a feeding on Ashes and a Shadow If Men can live by looking on their own Picture so might Adam's Soul by the third Principle It was worse with him than it is with an Elementary Body who can subsist a little while by feeding on it self 2. Now the Feast of Pentecost was bringing back through the Lords Incarnation the vertue of the holy World viz. the Paradisical Bread and Water of Life for the Soul to feast on The true Flesh and Blood of Christs Heavenly Humanity this pure Water of Meekness is in the Soul a Well of Living Water springing up to Eternal Life 3. The pouring forth of the Holy Ghost was thus effected The Darkness into which the Soul had cast it self caused a violent anguish that anguish of its own Nature generates a fierce hungry Fire And higher than this the Humane Soul of its own ability since its Captivity goeth not Now such Souls as can get no satiety in the Spirit of their will from God but go to the third Principle do as Sâ—ul who waited not for Samuel but considering his streights Offered a Burnt-offering himself and so lost the Kingdom But so did not the Lords Disciples for they waited till the Lord came Where is he that learneth the lesson this Mystery unfoldeth He shall hear and understand the things which none of the divided Languages can possibly express and sometimes may see and penetrate what it is not lawful to utter 4. Pluck out the Earthy guessing and pretended seeing stop the Ear against the delusive Charmer then shall not the outward Reason like the Sun dazle nor Thunder or the roaring of the Sea amuse the raging Waves shall be countermanded and thy Ark will be in inward Tranquillity 5. The pouring out of the Holy Ghost did enkindle the Souls Anguish and Fire into a Light and Divine serenity of meek Love Now as the blinking Lamp flaming from a small spark enlighteneth a little Boom and the greater Fire of a Torch yields a more eminent Lustre So the greater the Anguish the greater the Fire and the greater also is the Light when the Lord enkindles it to a Love flame that according to its exalted vivacity it be proportionably as it weâ—e Tinctured reaching hard after the Resurrection from the dead 6. Now were the Bands of their Tongues unloosed by their opening the power World in this World for by how much we are by wrath and death Captivated by so much are we impotent But where the Spirit of God unites with Mans Spirit it frees him from all restrictive Ligaments that with the Word there may be power But the following Question â—reating of this Suâ—â—â—ct â—oâ—â— is not â—eresaid to this third Branch Q. 146. How is the difference or distinction of Languages among them to be understood that they have all at one instant spoken all Languages at once in one sence so that people of all Nations understood them A. 1. Man's Fall cast him from the unity into the multiplicity Before which Fall he stood in the one holy power his Word being in God was by his Almightiness Mighty ruling in through and over the multiplicity his Words were as many Arrows in a Quiver penetrating all things As the Arrow out of a Bow of Steel doth the Air. But Mans Fall into the multiplicity disarm'd him render'd him impotent only some have a little power to see into one property some into another but were all Mens Abilities united it were but some pieces of the multiplicity far short of the Unity 2. Man is an Image of the whole Trinity and the Astral and Elementary Worlds Image Heavenly Things and Places while Man therefore kept his station he was in the Divine Centre but his departure thence dejected him into the circumference Wheel of Nature or Out-birth thenceforth was the Centre or Holy Fountain hid 3. The Lord Jesus Christ as he is the only Begotten Son of God is the Eternal speaking Word which may be understood to be Eternally generated out of the Eternal Father or first Principle as our four Forms or Anguishes generate naturally the Liberty or Light which is call'd the fifth This is the first Word the creating speaking holy Word from Eternity 1 John 1 2 3. 4. The next is the created Word the holy World wherein the Almighty Word doth through the Virgin of Divine Wisdom Image himself It may be compared to a holy Eternal Book whereof the Angels are Golden Letters sounded in Divine Harmony In which Book the Almighty with delight reads his own glorious ineffable tremendous
the Lamb was eaten as in haste and with bitter Herbs The Supper as in a Table gesture of such as have attained rest not by violent killing as That but by a free Issue of the highest and sweet Tincture as is That producing Bread and Wine and remaining in them 2. So high is it that it hath been thought by some of the Learned tho' erroneously that the Spirit of Wine is the true Fire of Nature 3. That it might be a Medium for conveyance for so great was the Precipice down which Man fell that he must be followed or for ever lost but tho' he fell into the Mortal Elementary State and the Elements of Bread and Wine blessed for his use yet these are not the Medium The Tincture is a Virgin a Servant to Virgin Sophis who tho' it be not purely Divine yet is such a Servant indeed as in whom is no guile 3. The Tincture whence issueth the Corn and Vine is the middle Earth betwixt the Heavenly or Paradifical Earth as the most superior and the Mortal as the most inferior This is therefore the proper Medium Here the Souls fiery hunger in the Promise meets the Divine Love and Grace the Living Word or Power World bringing in and with the Flesh and Blood of Christ's Heavenly Humanity which is the Emmanuel the Hope the Joy and Eternal Spouse of the Fire Soul and the Lord Husband and Crown of the enlightened renewed meek Spirit fore here the two Tiâ—ctures are united for â—ver and is neither Male nor Female but our Christ is all in all Q. 157. Whether is the True Testamentary Enjoyment or Participation bound meerly to the Apostolical Practice and Observation or whether also men may have Power or Authority to alter and change This Ordinance as is done now-a-days A. 1. Amongst men the Law making Power only hath Authority to change and alter Laws And a Testator dying no one may alter the Will and Testament ratified by the deceased On much higher and surer Reason is it therefore that no man or all men may alter or change This Ordinance or reject any of God's Institutions no more than two or three School-boys can root up the Basis of Philosophy or two or three Thieves or other Criminals change the publick Statuâ—es of a State or Kingdom 2. This will be acknowledged in words but when men come to measure Heavenly Mysteries by the Form of Words and Those Words by the Standard of Reason and That Reason corrupted by their Lusts disputes are raised without end and Obstinacy is the Disputant for the unregenerate man hath a perverse Will so that such of them as can attain the most exact Form of Godliness are only thereby the more confirmed in their Ungodliness 3. Could such do every Outward Ordinance with direct exactness of every gesture speak the words and only those spoken and done by the Lord himself without the Regenerating Spirit of Christ they would transgress the Rule still be in the Livery of Christ Traitors to Him fight against Him under His own Banners the Lord's Supper will be to such as the Sop to Judas who did after kiss and betray Such men receive the Heavenly Dews but bear fruit to self and That fruit the Grapes of Sodom they err in every work of their hands their very plowing is sin their Metonymies and other Tropes are airy distinctions of the words of the Institution like the endless Genealogies of the unbelieving Jews 4. Thus we see men guided by the Properties of the first Principle clothing their Hypocrisie by the Images and Maxims of the third do turn That blessed Ordinance which was to be as a Bond of Peace into Enmity And what wonder they should endeavour to impose their dark notions on others by hostile force as wild Beasts are to be dealt with not having the Light of the second to guide their Understandings as Children of the day But the new Nature of Gods Child is fed by that whereof it is Begotten and because the love of every such is sincere their hunger is earnest and is in proportion satisfied as it is in power and vigor excited Q. 158. Whether also is the Testament powerful in the alter'd or chang'd Ordinance or not A. 1. The misapprehending of this Question may either on the one hand encourage to make unwarrantable alterations arbitrarily or persist in them after being found to be such Or on the other hand unnecessarily to decline all Communion or despair of Vertue from the Ordinance because something said or done at the Administration seem not expresly commanded in the form recorded in the Institution Wherefore 2. To make way to the Answer 1. Something must be said to the Institution of the Sacrament it self 2. Something to the partakers 1. In the Sacrament are 1. The Form and Materials 2. The Force and Vertue 3. The Medium 1. The Form and Materials are meant in the words take eat this and take drink this this intends the Elements or Accidents of Bread and Wine 2. The force and Vertue meant by the words this is my Body is my Blood viz. are that Heavenly Flesh and Blood of Christ the Food of the Eternal Soul It is Christs Spiritual Humanity whereby he doth substantially inhabit the Souls of all who open to him their hungry and thirsty Mouth sups with them and is himself the true Bread and Water of Eternal Paradisical Divine Life 3. 3. The Place or Medium and this is not Christ himself tho' in his Heavenly Humanity he is not shut out of any Heaven for he is in or rather is all Heavenly Places Also the Medium neither can be the Elements of Bread and Wine for they are Mortal Accidents not Substances But the Tincture whence groweth the Bread and Wine is the Medium for that is Pure and Immortal and for the sake whereof the Idea of the Creatures shall be raised into the Glorious liberty of the Children of God 4. Something preparatory to the Answer is concerning the partakers of the Sacrament be the subdivisions how many soever there will be found at last but two sorts The Wise and the Unwise both call'd Virgins The one really and in Heart the other feigned and only in shew The one those of the day generated in the Glory and Love of the second principle the other of darkness in the works of the first principle 5. The Child of wrath can eat only and drink the Elementary part which hath in it the good and evil properties the Imaged Powers of Wrath and Love extending only to his Mortal Elementary Life wherewith neither his Eternal Soul nor Eternal Spirit of the Mind are really fed but starve and therefore so eats he and drinks he Damnation to himself not discerning the Lords Body viz. not receiving nourishment from the Heavenly Food the Lords real Body but only the Elementary And his Astral or Siderial Spirit cannot receive so much as the pure Medium and keep it
into everlasting Indignation Wrath Tribulation and Anguish who can dwell with devouring Fire under the Wrath of the Lamb Q. 167. What is the Dying of a true Christian What of him Dyeth A. 1. The Dying here inquired is call'd a Sleep which alludes to Adam who not exerting his Power became as one fainting and fell into a deep Sleep in which time his Female Property was divided from him and he slumbered to the Unity of the Paradisical Life and then was opened in him the divided state partly and but partly Paradisical for it was a begun Declension into the Dividings of the Astral Multiplicity And by Eves and his Eating the Fruit of the third Principle soon wrought in them dismal Effects for he lived no longer according to the Universal Will but set up a private Self-will as Law-maker ceasing to Rule over the Astral Powers he fell under them and so sadly as to be relieved and collect support and food from them given up to their contrary Properties and became a Beast as to his outward Body the deadness of part whereof degraded him so far as to render him by his Bones Skin and other insensible Parts to the baseness of Vegetatives and all this not transient as are some Astral Impressions but as a strong Prison out of which is no escape but by demolishing the Walls and Fabrick This is the desolate Wilderness which was signified by the going of the the Lord Jesus out of Canaan into the Wilderness to be there Forty days teÌ„mpted of the Devil after Fasting 2. Thus may a glimpse be seen what Adam's Sleep and after that his Fall introduced It chang'd his first Principle by darkning the Divine Eye of his second from great Power and active Vigor such as is that of the mighty Angels into Discord Rage Envy Fury c. and it chang'd his third Principle from so great Purity Transparency and Aptitude to have done Eternally the Offices of his great Soul and Divine Spirit into a gross obscene filthy palpable feeble sickly bestial perishing Carcass or Sack of Worms 3. Now when the Sun of Righteousness descends into this dark Dungeon he more or less according to the growth of the Regenerate Child by his pure meek Spirit appeaseth the Disorders of the Soul and halloweth it directing correcting and confirming a resolved will to obey as simply as a little Child and to persevere as a strong Man in Christ by which the Internal Man is in great part made God's Child and Image reaching toward the Love flame pressing strongly thitherward and groans to be with the Lord but still is the Body as little affected as the Bark of a Tree with the Virtue of the Fruit or as a Candlestick with the lustre of the Taper or as the Earth with the Astral Vertue rouâ—ing the Principles of Sulphur and Mercury in the saline Spirit in and through it 4. What can be done with this Body If it were possible to affect it so as the East-India Nut-tree doth that the Mercurial Vertue arising with Sulphur into a Nutmâ—g on a Clove for the Stud the Bark should be a Cinnamon it were somewhat but our Carcass is as senseless of the inward Man's Divine Work as the Bone is the Respondence and Intercourse the Spirits have through the Arteries and venal Channels or as the Beasts Hide is of the Astral Impulses moving the Animal Therefore it must like a Husk shell off and the Natural Body as a Grain of Wheat be sowed into the Elements whence it derived as the Corn into the Earth and die before it can increase and rise a spiritual Body 5. Thus dieth the Elementary part of the true Christian. How dieth the Wise-Man as the Fool returning into the Mouth whence it was spoken The Astral Body also rather disappears than dies but being dissolved from the ancient Obligations to the bestial Body it may remain at the Will of the Noble Soul to be its Chariot wherewith as a Medium it sometimes doth vouchsafe a loving Visit to his dear Christian Friend yet in the Body but most easily when such a one sleepeth as to the Elementary Man and seeth heareth and toucheth with his Astral Man for then may the precious separate Soul if it desires it as familiarly have access and converse with his dear Friend or Brother as two Men of one Language may and this hath been and may be to the great Satisfaction and Edification of the surviving Christian though not frequently because of Mens unworthiness or for fear of Impostures and especially because the Lord only is abundantly and infinitely all-sufficient by his own Omnipotence and Omnipresence 6. As Adam slept to the Holy Paradifical Virgin state and awaked to the bestial World's Adulterous state so the true Christian's Death is a sleeping to that sleep of his viz. The filthy sickly cumbring prophane Elementary Life and an awaking to the pure holy triumphant dear sweet child-like angelical Endless Life it transfers him out of the howling Wilderness of Temptation into Eternal Canaan out of a Dungeon into the glorious Liberty of the Sons of God out of the Turba of perplexing Multiplicity and restless wrestling of contrary Properties into the equal Temperature and Calm harmonious complete Unity the private Self being extinct he entreth the Universal sacred Freedom of the Lord's Redeemed ones Q. 168. What is the Dying of the wicked in that it is called an Eternal Dying A. 1. It hath been often inculcated in these Writings that all Men are in all the three Principles of one Blood but their difference is notorious for though they are almost the same in their first and third Principles and much what alike though not without great distance of degrees in their second Principle yet here is the immense difference that in some their second Principle like the House of Saul impairs and gradually as it were insensibly extinguisheth to a dismal blackness to be felt at length and in others the Regeneration calmly yet with irresistible sweet force more and more opens that Principle which as the House of David improves and flourisheth 2. From these dear Children if their Progress hath been Crown'd with Perseverance their third Principle is like Trash and dusty Rubbish scatter'd about a firm built Structure fully finished which Death like an impetuous Storm with rapid Motion disperseth or as a mounting Torrent of Water violently bears away leaving the Fabrick unconcern'd But the third Principle is to the other his Fortress Confidence Retreat Refuge Rest Joy Hope Treasure and his all therefore Death at once surprizing him and snatching that away he and it perish together his only home falleth for want of Foundation the Cistern he hath hewn is broken having no Water in it nor can hold it if any were entrusted thereinto which shews the fault to be in the very bottom else it might hold some Water but the truth is it hath no bottom at all The World to the one is either as it is to
Eternity their four Forms are attoned by his Light their Discord by his Unity is composed his Presence kills their lofty Thoughts it also makes them alive to him his Fire refineth them they are always prostrate at his Feet mortified and mortifying continually and makes them a Living Sacrifice day by day till Death become their intimate associate and safe retreat from the Storm Yet these things are so secretly done in the new Heart that the Heart it self can better conceive it than the Brain but how can the Idea thereof be comprehended by us who are comprehended by it When we would form it we cannot for we viz. our new Man is formed by it How can we express it seeing we are the Letters by which it expresseth it self It is far above the Languages got at Babel but when the Spirits of the Letters shall be restored the renewed Spirit shall find a Tongue to be a Herauld for the King of Kings put to silence all contrary discording sounds and Dethrone all other Rule Authority and Power in us Amen 3. 17. That then is or cometh the End the Judgment being ended the End hath found the Beginning When the Six Working Days of the Week are ended Masters use to Reckon with their Hirelings and give them their Wages then followeth the Day of Rest. When the six working Properties have wrought their designed end in any Creature they give up themselves into the seventh wherein to rest the doing whereof bringeth the End into the Beginning when the Wheat is in the Barn and the Tares cast away the Harvest is ended 18. A few words are offer'd to be consider'd concerning the End 1. Whether the Elements shall be dissolved at the instant of the Resurrection or not remain till the compleat End of the Judgment Day Answ. It may seem otherwise for they must as Conservatories be opened that is the Earth viz. Hell or the Grave must deliver up the Dead which shall be therein or how else shall the Mighty men call to the Rocks to cover them also the â—ea deliver the Dead conserved therein the Air the words it treasur'd in it 2. Whether the Elements may not remain and yet the Sun Moon and Stars be resolved into their Aether Answ. As there was Light the three first days of the Creation out-spoken by the Word which was as a dispersed Light before the collecting the same into the Sun Moon and Stars so may the collected Light pass back into the dispersed Light to form that one Great Day which is not to admit of Revolutions of Night and Day but only the Day and Night of the two Incomprehensible Principles which may be both in one place at one time without justling one the other and be the full End of Specifick and revolved Time may be at the Commencement or Morning of that Day and the full entring on Eternity not be till the End or Evening of that Day when the Judge shall give to each World the Inhabitants thereof as their Magick Wills have severally tinctured and formed them thereunto whether of the Day Love and Purity or of Blackness Wrath and Abominations And this is the absolute Period of the Genus and Thing which we call Time 19. The End of Time may be demonstrated in the regenerated Children thus When the Holy Fire of God on the Altar in the Soul hath separated the Earthy part from the new Man so that by resignation of the Will the Love flame is raised up the Spirit of that Man entreth into God and in a measure into such rest as ends the multiplicity and possesseth the Eternal Unity for his earthy salt corrupt Sulphur and Mortal Mercury is changeable into the Saline Property Paradisical Flesh or Sulphur and Spiritual Mercury by the Holy Tincture whereof in this Separation the renewed Image becomes capable And if the inward new Man be enabled to press forward it may in this very most secret Path attain the Resurrection from the Dead in the outward Man and be translated into the Life of Enoch Thus also we see that Antimony calcin'd by the solar Rays through Burning Glasses may both be augmented to almost half in weight and also changed from a strong rank great Poison to a vigorous Balsam and potent Fortifier of decaying Nature shewing us how the Mutations of time cease and how to enter into a fixt serene Eternity 20. The End of Time may be also demonstrated in the Sons of Perdition thus That after all Warnings Judgments and Convictions they have met with they finally fix in Enmity and are Imaged into a private perverse Will the Circumferential Applications are restrained by the Central Fire which also stops up the Fountain of pure meek Water and clouds the Divine solar Influences of Light and therefore receive no increase as was said of Antimony but are subjected to a perpetuated Vanity nor can such be renewed but are obdurated they are not like Antimony transmuted from Poison to a sublimated Cordial but recede more fiercely into the endless Anguishes as Evaporation by Heat makes cold Poison the more deadly here also the Times of successive Good and Evil strife of Flesh and Spirit Resolves and Doubts are ceased and these Men are become Sensual in the most outward part stubborn and obstinate in the Astral which should be the rational part and furious haughty false and filthy in the Will of the Eternal Man So in the most outward sensitive part are meer Animals in the rational part stubborn besotted Fools and in the Immortal Souls Devils and all fixt so that if the Divine Sun should graciously shine on him he would but as a filthy heap of Horse-dung or a stinking watry Ditch generate the greater and more dangerous venomous loathsome reptils continually 21. That then the Kingdom shall be delivered up to the Father and God shall be all in all The Lord's Prayer Establisheth all the parts of it with this word For ihine is the Kingdom the Power and the Glory for ever of him and from him are all things and therefore also all things are for him they are the Manifestation of his Power and of his Love Infinite Power were Defective without Infinite Wisdom also Infinite Wisdom were impotent without Infinite Power again Infinite Power and Infinite Wisdom were infinitely Dreadful without Infinite Goodness but all three United is infinitely sufficient to support the weakest of the Lord 's little ones and blow to atoms the highest vastest Puissance of the Princes of the dark World the God of this World and hold them shut up for ever 22. The Lord Jesus saith in his Prayer concerning his to his Father Thine they were and thou gavest them me but that Grand Administration must be such as if it were said by the Lord Mine they are and I give them back to thee where lies a Mystery not obvious to any but the enlightened Mind which shall be spoken in a simple familiar way
the Infinite Original of all well pleasing and Wisdom the Process of both which is the Infinite Original of the All-holy Love and Goodness in these three is one Infinity yesterday to day and for ever by in and for whom are all the seven Spirits or Properties generating Harmoniously and Triumphantly at once and ever and in the United accord of their Powers subsisteth the Holy World Also in the separate Properties of six of the seven Spirits standeth immutably the Abyss of the Dark World which though in their Union is truly and really existent yet till the Separation is for ever unmanifested as in the preceding Answers is often most conspicuous as in many places of the Writings of the blessed Jacob Behmen and particularly in the 15th of the Answers v. 3. 4. 16. And here are the two Eternal Worlds or Principles of Love and Anger Darkness and Light known only in the Separation of the Properties in the Creatures so that either both or neither is Eternal they having the Self-same Eternal Root and Consistence and the effluenced Creation is Imaged either by all the seven Spirits in Harmony or by all of them in Discord where one or more potently tyrannizeth over the rest and thus stand the Heavenly and Hellish Powers with the Holy Glorious and contrary Impious black Inhabitants And when the Out-world viz. the Astral was formed the two Eternal Worlds impressed their Images therein over which Man as the second Race of Intellectuals was natural Lord substituted to hold the Dominion wherein while he stood was no more subject to Mutation having his habitation in the Holy World than Eternity is to time which it comprehendeth but is not measur'd by for Eternity and the Eternal Inhabitants are never old but as their Worlds are ever new so themselves ever young there being no to Morrow but all is to Day with and in them And this is firmly true in both Worlds 17. But his Fall subjected him to the various Alterations of Time his Out-birth becoming subject thereunto which how Evil soever is not the greatest Evil for as on the one hand it as it were cut him off from the firm Land of Holiness to be like a floating isle of Vanity and Vexation so on the other hand the tossed Turf is not so swallow'd up as immediately to sink nor is so far driven but there remains a possibility by the sweet gales of the Holy Spirit to be reunited to the firm Land whence it had broken it self whereas the Apostate Angels like a piece of a Rock sank into the Deep without hope of reverting and cementing for ever having deprived themselves of all but one Principle and are destitute of a Medium having no falt in themselves whereas in Man on this side fixt Enmity there is United to their first fierce dark Anguish an intrusted Talent of inspoken Grace like a Tincture of the meek humble Principle of Love both inward Worlds being Imaged in the outward transient floating Life 18. Thus was it that Infinite Goodness moved Infinite Pity and Compassion that the Son of God himself took our Humanity and made it a Sacrifice to attone in us the enraged Forms of our first Principle being the Father's Property according to which he is call'd a consuming Fire and reunite us in the Kingdom and second Principle of Love Peace Meekness Purity and true Wisdom for without the Out-birth which is the place of Mutation no change can be because in the Astral Powers are the Alterations effected for there are the Figures of both the hidden Worlds therefore the least thought of transmuting the state of the Holy to Prophaneness or the Wicked to relaxation of their Torment were to admit or suggest a Contradiction no less absurd than to assign Eternity to the Vanity of the present transient momentany Life or to impeach Eternal Omnipotent stability with a possibility of Annihilation See the part of Answer of the blessed Jacob Behmen to the 15th of these Questions in the four first Verses also the rest of that Answer to the End Meditations and brief Contemplations on some of the Preceding Questions Propounded by Jacob Behmen On the 14th Question and Answer What is Lucifer's Office in Hell with his Legions 1. MY Soul first ponder thou God's Immensity as it is written Whither shall I go from thy Presence This Globe of Earth and Sea is great but to the Deep from Stars to Stars is a Point to a vast Circumference and that vast Deep is a Pâ—iâ—t to another proportionably greater than this is to our Ball and all that and twenty or twenty Thousands of such Deeps compared with him is nothing for if spoken out by him it leaves him nothing the less for he is still Infinite as before Again Meditate thou his Omnipresence for no Point or least Centre of the least imaginable Circle exempts him but in every such part is the same Infinite undivided Jehovah entirely present his Omniscience is hence undeniable for he that made the Eye shall he not see Behold again his Omnipotency whereby he from Eternity and in Eternity generates his only Son and by him all Eternal Glories and in the Abyss of his Infinite Power is the Dark Abyss If I make my Bed in Hell thou art there 2. Concerning Man reflect thou my Soul with Grief and Astonishment What a God is he who the black Mouths of vile crawling Worms and proud Dust do desperately abuse by Prophane Swearing as if that Holy and fearful awful Name were a common thing wherewith they make Blasphemously bold with Hellish Execrations Again what a Hell doth the Lord's Redemption free all from whose discording Forms of Life in the first Principle are attoned by kindling the saving renewing Light of Life in them of the Holy second Principle being a fifth Form and Quintessence turning by the Supream Tincture Everlasting Dying into Eternal Life and Regenerating a Holy bright Child out of a Corrupt dark impure Mother Again what can the Summit of selfish Skill sharpest Speculation and Penetration into Divine Sacred Mysteries avail if thou arrive not iâ— to the Holy self-same Principle by Mortification and the first Resurrection what short of that can make thee better than the Devils what can the exactest Form of Godliness advantage thee more than it doth him who can transform himself into an Angel of Light 3. Then O my Soul proceed on to Meekness Integrity Faith and Love in Holy Fear till thou come to the Feet of thy Jesus Or move not at all but remain a Swine a Dog a Beast inwardly a Devil for if thou goest part of the way only thy Fall as of a Stone from a high place is the most heavy but to persevere will make thee more blessedly Happy than Hell is miserably Accursed On the 15th Question and Answer Hath Hell a Temporary Beginning or Eternal c. 1. Here opens a wide Prospect into the Abyss of Eternity for as the Dark World originates from the Abyss
Answer What are the Dominions of Angels Evil and Good 1. David meditating the Heavens is transported into admiration What is Man c. But what place may be found low enough for Man to prostrate himself in who seriously considers his loathsom deformity by sin he is so far baser than the Outward Heavens which yet must pass away that he is viler than the Beast that perisheth for his subjection to vanity he owes to us is also viler than the Earth which bearing our Curse yet gratefully pays what it can for the Blessings showering on it and willingly serves the higher Influences of Nature to generate â—â—ble Concretes and were it delivered from our Curse would gladly travel for Paradisical Productions but our heavy Curse is so eating that it hath entred the Timber and Walls therefore must this House needs as that having the incurable Leprosie be pull'd down We are also viler than the poisonous abominable Reptiles for they are but figures of the Forms of the Black World but sinful Man is really united to them Man also considered as Reprobate is worse than the Devils both as he is lower by Creation and higher by aggravated transgression having trampled on the Only and most excellent Remedy freely offered for his recovery the Sacrifice of the most Holy of Holies the Only Eternal Son of God 2. And is there no Creature so vile as Man Hold this O my Soul for thy Contemplation remain confounded and astonished Let not thy Tongue smother what thy Intellect sees nor thy Pride refuse thy just Reproach flatter not paint not indulge not but depart out of thy self as now clotâ—ed with thy shame and filth cry to him whose Eternal Mercy is infinite for pity to cast his skirt over thee now in thy Blood And when thou contemplatest the sublime Wisdom excellent Power and irresistible Activity of the Angelical Hosts and remembrest that the subtilty of a Fox the strength of an Ass the nimbleness of a Fly the skill of a Bee surpass thee yet know if regenerate into the Image of Jesus Christ thou maist by humble Obedience and willing Child-like Resignation to the Conduct of the Councils from above obtain That Wisdom which the Old Serpent is short of thou maist â—ate sin in a measure as the Holy Angels do viz. really because it is sin and universally thou maist love Holiness Purity and Modesty sincerely in a measure the perfection of which Love is the Glory of the Heavenly Hosts Let not therefore the shame of thy nakedness so sink thee but that thy humble thoughts may offer up Volumes of Blessings for any possibility of recovery To Thee therefore who art all in all and infinitely above all be offered up my wretched all To Thee who art all pity be presented my mournful earnest prayer graciously lay hold on my feeble Faith let thy Wind blow Life on my dry Bones To Thee O Fountain of Goodness be given all my weeping praises and my whole Soul for ever On the 20th Question and Answer Out of what is the Visible World created c. 1. This Visible World is originated out of the Eternal thence sprung the Stars and four Elements of the one Element the Fire actuates separates and digests the other three Elements and the Father of Nature forms all according to the Will modell'd by the Wisdom and giveth the Tincture Thus the Fire-life in Man's Mortal Body helps three Concâ—ctions the first in the stomach as the Chilus nourishing by assimilation answering to the Air the second in the Mesentery and Liver as Blood answering to Water the third Concâ—ction is the passing by the Veins into the gross Members and by the Arteries to the more fine and to add to the Bones answering to Earth and Stones in each of which is a separation of the unprofitable part This Contemplation well raised David to say I am fearfully and wonderfully made And as in our Mortal Man there is something surviving viz. the Tincture so in the Out-birth the Soul of it and Tincture being out of the Eternal Nature and the first Principle is indissoluble but the Bestial Man sees not that but greedily catcheth at the Husk and Hogs-meat the excrementitious part 2. But thou Ohâ—my Spirit shew by thy humble meekness thy high extraction shew by thy Resignation to the universal Will of thy Creator that thou art his Child keep thy Lamp clean that being enkindled by the Fire from above thou maist enlighten the dark Forms of my Immortal Soul to know and live to God and will purely his will that my Souls heat may be a Love fire and that Love-fire may be a constant Fountain for thy Love-flame That as every individual Creature in their degree do unawares to themselves shew the Almighty Power and Infinite Wisdom of God thou being intrusted more than they all with five Talents maist prove them to ten and shew understandingly not only his Infinite Power and Wisdom but Infinite Goodness Grace Clemency Condescension Pity Love Bounty and Sweetness And thou Oh my Astral and gross Body beware lest the poor Brutes by serving thee while they live and dying to keep thee alive out-strip thee not so far as to witness against thee that thou hast prevented the end of thine own Creation and theirs by insatiably lusting to indulge and serve thy self thereby robbing thy Soveraign of the fruits of his Vineyard On the 21th Question and Answer Whence proceeded Evil as poisonous Creatures here c. 1. Out of the Dark Confusion by the Apostasie of Lucifer and his Legions the Fiat moving by the Separator to bring forth every Power strenuously willed to make it self creaturely so was it the seven Planets severally bear the seven separate Powers and according to them are impressed the Evil and Good Properties on Plants Minerals and Sensitives not that any one is wholly one but one is prevalent and the rest subservient Thus evil venomous loathsom voracious fierce Creatures and things have existence yet shineth the Sun descendeth the sweet drops on them and springeth up the fatness of the Earth for them 2. Behold here the overflowing Bounty of the gracious God who feeds the young Lions and young Ravens the Dragons and Serpents of the Wilderness Behold here also his Long-suffering who not only spares but heaps up outward blessings on far worse viz. obstinate hardened seared Rebels for whom he hath not spared his own Son and on whom he hath waited counselling entreating convincing resisting and dropping Line upon Line perhaps twenty forty and on some fifty years for ever blessed be that abused Creator that bleeding Redeemer that grieved Holy Ghost 3. Come hither all my Inward Powers prostrate your selves be enkindled by this Holy Fire learn to do good for evil blessing for cursing Be astonished O my Soul that ever thou didst return black ingratitude and trample on heavenly Blood and Bowels of Mercy that thou hast not only been as the worst of Beasts but much more vile and
study strive and practise the turning a less degree of good into a greater not better into worse but like thy great Guide and Pole-Star improve not impair turn to him in whom only ceaseth thy variation thou mayest in his Power find the Evil fall and the Good have a Resurrection On the 30th Question and Answer Of the Distinction or Difference of the Sperm or Seed of Metals Stones Vegetatives c. 1. Behold we here God's Infinity how little a part whereof is this vast deep from Stars to Stars the whole being but a Point to the infinite Abyss and in this Deep how sure and demonstrable is God's Omnipresence and Universal Grace How to be adored and with most profound Humility to be admired and that with sincere transport of exalted inflamed Love which is to begin Eternity and be listed here in the Roll of Celestial Worshippers 2. Behold we also how Omnipotent Goodness first spake the Sperm in the great Mystery and ever speaketh little Beginnings scarce visible into great Attainments like as those large big-bellied Clouds which overcast the Sun is a Cloath wove of most small Threads spun of the breath of the low Lands Man even thus who ruleth the gentle and tameth the wild Beasts governing the Terrestrial Globe is the first Six Days as observ'd by the curious as Milk the second Nine Days as choaked Blood in a few more Days by the commixture of the Spirits and the Blood coagulates into a thin Skin like that within an Egg shell in which three little Swellings like Bladders floating arise in them are formed the Liver Heart and Brain of that Proud Beast who when formed is fed at the Navel till wanting nourishment and room breaketh the Panicles letting in Air and following it having it self been the substance of venom with wretched Pain enters the World like a poor Worm in a most forlorn frail tender deplorable manner and being the Epitomy of the whole shews us what is that Power that ripens such pitiful Beginnings and keeps it so long from returning to its Dust whereto by very little means it is obnoxious This we are before we have sinned but what doth Sin make us after if our Teeth be on edge by our Father's eating sour Grapes what doth our eating of them make us to be 3. And now my Soul who is like thy God who thus base as we are became like us to make us like him as once we were and passing over the more noble Creatures the Angels became the Brother to us Worms and because to be born and live like us was not wholly enough was pleas'd Oh admirable to die like us thereby opening in us the Door of Eternal Life what an Abyss of pure Love is this On the 31th Question and Answer How is the Conjunction of Feminine and Masculine Kind effected whence the Seed and Growth existeth 1. The Meditation on this Question and Answer will continue the sad complaint of the last preceding for how far are we fallen from the Virgin Image into a state whereof depraved Humane Nature is ashamed and at which the remainders of Modesty which are not wholly defaced are offended The shiftless manner of our entrance on this Stage shews us more wretched than Birds or Beasts The Murther done by the First born of Woman the strict Law for Circumcising of Men and for Purifying of Women after Child-bearing the Womens Confinement to one place at the Temple with many things of like import all shew what the breach of Modesty following the dividing of the Tinctures was 2. But on the growth proceeding from the Conjunction the Soul may a little stay it self from utter sinking that though it is written who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean not one yet all things are possible to Omnipotence the God of Might and Goodness hath by bringing a clean thing into an unclean cleansed the unclean and so brought Good out of Evil. 3. Teach us O Lord that Divine Skill to fetch Honey out of the Devourers Belly Let the sore Anguish of Soul the New Man travels with as consequent to the rent made by the dividing of the Tinctures be a little eased â—et that bitter Cup have some of the sweet pure Water of the Fountain opened by the Son of the Virgin be put thereinto Let his Skirt be thrown over our Shame Let after a Night of Mourning and Heaviness come some glimpse of Daunings Let the Beast as well as the false Prophet be cast out to make room for the dear Precious Virgin Image the true Bride Joy and Glory of the Fire-Soul and is that signified by the Apostle when he said the Woman is the glory of the Man but the Earthy Woman ought to have Power on or over her Head because of the pure Modest Virginity of the Angels On the 32 Question and Answer Of the Tincture in the Spermatick Kind or Species whence Growing and Lustre ariseth 1. Of the Tincture may be said as of the Wind thou hearest the sound thereof but seest not whence it cometh nor whither it goeth by it Clouds Seas Ships Trees c. are driven overthrown rent and hurried and Earthquakes caused yet it self invisible to the outward Eye So by the Tincture not only Vegetables Minerals Animals Men the Elements and Stars but Heaven Earth Hell Angels Saints Devils and damned Creatures are acted affected and distinguished yet who may be said to see it for it is above the Horoscope of the Senses It must in Man be look'd for in the Eternal part by the Eye of the Intellect 2. The ball of the Eye seeth all things visible but seeth not it self so may it be apprehended of the Tincture in us which seeth the Tincture in the Stars and in the Terrestrial Stars the Pretious Stones Metals Vital Spirit of Animals and Vegetatives yet cannot penetrate their own Tincture unless the inward Eye be divinely opened to that Vision which how few are and of those few how imperfect Natural Philosophy is exercised in the Inclination Vertue Variety Power Connexion Sympathy and Antipathy of Nature but it is Theosophy that is Comprehensive of the Spirit Root Mystery and Property of every Essence and how and why they transform into variety whither they tend what they figure and how they transmute into more excellent by subliming the Tincture when set at liberty how the exalted Tincture is fortified to the Salvation of one and how vitiated to the Damnation of another for so rich is the Treasure so large the Talent that it must be accompted for with Usury 3. And is this O my Soul entrusted to thee regard it as thy life beware thou do not as did the fallen Angels if the Light that is in thee be Darkness how great is that Darkness If thou use thy Members to unrighteousness it is sinful and an unpenitent habit ruinous as a Man may Bleed to death by one vein but if the precious Tincture be once marr'd and prophaned it is as
pure Element 7. In the holy Ternary and pure Element spring the Paradisical Fruits and the Virgin of Wisdom is the great Spirit in the whole Heavenly World and the Holy Element is her Body But the Deity is Incomprehensible yet as a Soul to a Body in the Holy Ternary The Virgin of God's Wisdom Christ brought with him to be a Bride to our Souls and the Holy Ternary which is his Body is the Food of our Souls Amen John 6. 56. 8. Baptism was not instituted in respect of the Earthly Man which belonged to Earth nor of the Heavenly Man which was pure already but for the poor Souls sake for though we may have a new Body we cannot have a new Soul that being out of the Eternity Therefore as the Holy Ghost over-shadowed and impregnated Mary so the Water out of the Heavenly Matrix coming out of the Holy Ternary in the Baptism over-shadoweth and filleth the Soul and so reneweth the Earthy Water of the Out-birth washing it clean that it is in resignation a pure Angel and may eat of the Heavenly Fruit which is the cause of Baptism Thenceforth if it incline it self forward into God this World is only bound or tyed to it till it enter into Death CHAP. XXIII Of the Testaments of Christ Baptism and the Supper 1. CHrist said he would be with us always and would give us his Body and Blood for Meat and Drink 2. The Deity is not divided and if the Father be every where so is the Son his Heart nor is the Son divided and a spark of the Deity in his Body and the rest every where When Christ sat with his Disciples he gave them his Flesh and Blood viz. His holy Heavenly Body in the second Principle and his holy Heavenly Blood in the pure Element wherein is the holy Tincture and Holy Life 3. The holy pure Element is every where and substantial generated of God therein is the Ternariâ—â— Sanctus and that is the heavenly Body of Christ with our here assumed Soul in it with the fulness of the Deity therein 4. Thus the regenerated Soul putteth on the Body of Christ viz. his Eternal Humanity which is out of the holy Element and which giveth the new Body Meat and Drink The Father every where from Eternity to Eternity doth generate the Son and from both doth the Holy Ghost every where proceed 5. The inward Element which compriseth this World became Christ's Eternal Body the Deity espoused it self thereunto and acteth the Heavenly new Humanity which is an Omnipresent Creature such as captivated all Devils Thus all Men who earnestly and stedfastly draw near to Christ are in their new Man in Heaven who acteth their new Humanity Christ hath taken this Pledge of us viz. our Souls in Mary 6. Christ began his Baptism by John his fore-runner who was born before Christ signifying that Water is the cause and beginning of the Life and in it by the Tincture cometh Sulphur wherein is vital Motion And in the Sulphur and Water the Tincture after causeth Blood 7. In the same order is the Regeneration that the Soul be Baptized in the Water of Eternal Life and then the grain of Mustard-seed of the Pearl be sown that it become a new Fruit in God 8. Children ought to be Baptized or the Covenant is contemned for though Children know not that which is done to them yet it is not in our fore-knowing but in God's that the Covenant stands and if thou as the tree be in the Covenant so may thy Child as the branch thy Faith is its Faith Art thou a true Christian Thy Child at the kindling of its Life passeth into the Covenant yet omit not to Baptize for when 't is born 't is sever'd from the tree and thou must with thy Faith and Prayer present it 9. And because the outward Body is in this World therefore the outward Water is requisite and with the inward Water of Eternal Life the Holy Ghost in the Covenant baptizeth the inward Man 10. Yet if after the Soul depart the Virgin passeth into the Centre of the Light of Life but if it again return is receiv'd And therefore was the other Testament of the Lord's Body and Blood left in which the outward Man hath the outward Elements of Bread and Wine The inward new Man feeds on Christ's heavenly Flesh and Blood and the Soul feeds on the pure Deity 11. The unworthy Receiver feeds outwardly on the four Elements and inwardly on the Wrath of God having departed as did the fallen Angels out of the Love CHAP. XXIV Of true Repentance 1. TO enter into true Repentance the Mind with all the Thoughts Purposes and Reason must be collected wholly into one will resolution and earnest desire to forsake all Abominations and fix the Soul in a stedfast Confidence in God's Mercy 2. That which terrifieth and with-holdeth arising from the greatness of Sin is of Sathan but every though but the least thought inclining the Will towards God and that it would fain enter into Repentance is not from self but the Love of God draweth his Spirit inviteth the noble Virgin calleth 3. Neglect not to give the Lord a meeting who will certainly give a hearty welcom Come Knock Pray he knows the Language of a hearty Sigh Depart not press from Sin so doth the Kingdom of God press into thee wait from day to day the greater the earnestness the greater will be the Jewel 4. But this Seed is not instantly a Tree The Devil would root it up many Storms rush on it every thing in this World is against it sometimes Sins cover it Conscience upbraids the Traveller even God's Children themselves rush on him he sometimes doth what he reproves in others even against his own Light and Purposes 5. When it is thus the Tree of Pearl is hidden for not being sowen in the outward Man which is not worthy of it but is Sathan's Seat that doth what the Soul opposeth It is sometimes done by the Spirit of the Stars in Man So that a Christian is not known to himself how much less to others and is often wounded in the strife for the Field in which the new Man grows is barren harsh cold sour and bitter but the new Man arm'd by the sharp Sword of Christ's Death is Conqueror growing as the Herb or Flower out of the Earth by the pleasant Sunshine CHAP. XXV Of the Dying Death Resurrection Ascension of Christ and his sitting on the right Hand of God his Father Also our Misery and the Divine Power of his Love 1. THE outward Man and its Actions Thoughts and Intents are Instruments of the Spirit of the great World which after Corrupt 2. None therefore should scorn another having our several Compositions Habits and Mutations according to our Constellations and Influences which are not wholly rooted out till Dissolution though Regeneration oppose the falshood of the outward corruptible Man 3. But the outward Man 's not
prudent exemplars in Manners great Proficients in Philosophy profound Casuists in Theology with so good progress as if they were Pillars in God's House and all this adorned with a blameless Conversation to human observation 3. But all this destitute and exclusive of a changed Will but retaining unmortified affections and desires having an unregenerate Heart a Soul dead to any Life of Resignation and Sacrifice but is still immutably stubborn is therefore as concerning the Faith reprobate for the right Faith is the right Will which divested of its self-lusts enters into the living Word whereas the other is without God in the World tho' flattering himself all his life long with the merits of Jesus Christ his share in them his Predestination from Eternity his assurance never to fall away whereas he was never risen with Christ but lies drowned with and under the desires of the present Evil World and lives wholly a stranger to the dying of Christ to the emptying of the corrupt self-will for the Pearl is in That man's account too dear nor will he buy Oyl Of the Company and Assistance of the Holy Angels 4. As Men fearing God readily help each other in their misery so do the Holy Angels powerfully assist Men for they affect the company of vertuous humble chast men themselves being very pure chast modest humble friendly and know no deceit or iniquity they have also great delight among little Infants and sometimes manifest themselves to them and play with them if they be the Children of God for they do nothing but what is innate in them both the Angels and the Children They have also great joy for one poor Soul delivered from the Snares of the Devil and are at hand ready to deliver such in their greatest extremities having an over ballance of Power to that of the Evil Angels else what Ruins would the Devils make in the busie execution of their Office in the Turba magna of terrible Storms c. as far as the fierce Wrath is therein enkindled were they not curb'd and drove away by the ministration of the Heavenly Hosts of the holy and mighty Angels sent out by the Almighty gracious Jehovah 5. There is therefore no cause at all of despair tho' the whole World seem to be against us Nor are Prayers to be made to them for they accept not that honour but direct us to God Whatever befals us is to purifie us as Gold for God aims to have fair lovely Children and of understanding to discover the Deceits of the Old Serpent God sets Heaven and Hell before us therefore must the Soul have Understanding to chuse and Faith to fight for it must be a continual Warriour If we make our selves fierce false covetous proud Devils we are so but if we image in our Souls humble meek submissiveness with a love to follow the Lord we enter into the Holy Principle and are in the Paradiâ—ical and Angelical Regiment Let all therefore be warned according to what they form their Spirits which is commended to seasonable and most serious and continued consideration CHAP. XV. Of the mixed World its wicked exercise being a Glass wherein every one may try out of what Spirit themselves are 1. MOst just and necessary is it to reprehend practical Impieties Immoralities and Debauchery especially among such professing goodness the which unchristian Conversation is chargeable on high and low Priest and People old and young who all are yet apt to account this a Golden Time and bless themselves in it tho' it is a time of lamentation being the opening of the last Seal and of pouring out the Vial of God's Wrath bringing to light the Wonders of Hell particularly the Pride and Oppression derived from those sent to the University enslaving the People in their Understandings by Constitutions Orders Statutes c. and in their Bodies and Estates by wresting from them their sweat and the fruit of their labours wherewith these pamper themselves a practice not grounded in Nature but is hellish for there one Form vexeth and plagueth another so that among these the Dog is more happy than the poor of the people 2. And this hath another consequent Evil in that it induceth and in a sort inforceth the poor to imitate them and to live by deceit doing that also swinishly which the other do in pride and bravery All which is convinced of great madness considering the shortness and uncertainty of the present time the great strict solemn Judgment day and the Eternity of the Life to come on the brink whereof we stand ready to enter unconceivable happiness by the narrow way or intolerable misery and shame by the broad way Yet this Chapter concludes that a sincere Christian doth not here wholly know himself seeing comparatively nothing but his vices for his Sanctity Christ hideth under his Cross. CHAP. XVI Of praying and fasting what praying its power use benefit and preparation to God's Kingdom is 1. THE earnest restless hunger and thirst of Man's Spirit after the meek rest of Divine Love from the Property of the driver being so impetuous that the Morning calleth to the Evening the Night to the Day and one Day to another panting when will the refreshment come Sheweth whence Man came and how greatly he is strayed having no place of rest till he be driven back to his still Eternal Mother the Eternal Nature for here the driver taketh him by the very throat he lieth as one among the slain in a great Battle who dares not lift up his head for fear of the cruel overflowing Conquerors or as one surrounded with malicious Foes who all strike at him to murther him or as one fallen into a deep Pit hoping for help only from above or as one fallen into a deep Sea swimming yet seeing no shoar sigheth for help from Heaven 2. So is it with Man's Soul for if the Soul search its own flesh blood marrow and bones they are Enemies incompassing and captivating it the Spirit of this World suppresseth it and would like a Sea drown it by pampering the Bestial Life the Devil also as a cruel proud Enemy draweth it into the fierce aking Abyss striking at it with hellish anguish and despair 3. Then if it will be saved its Will must depart from the outward and from its own thoughts and mind into God's mercy for the Word that made Man's Soul became Man and his holy Humanity the flesh of the Eternal Word his food his blood also the Water of Eternal Life is as a puâ—e new Body and this Word was a meek pure desirous Love and then the Holy Ghost leads it out of Prison from the Battle of the driver cooling its flames and the Soul becomes an humble Child 4. When the whole man resolves into a Will of leaving every Evil and seeking God with the whole heart he is received as Daniel when he began to set himself to pray and chasten himself the command came forth But the Life is
and groaneth to have it Banished for the outward devoureth the inward if the inward continue not in strife 2. Yet the three Principles are one in another The Soul is the Jewel the Spirit is the finder of the Jewel the Earthy Spirit is the â—eeker the Earthy Body is the Mystery so three seekers belong to the Soul 3. We undervalue not the outward Life it shews Gods Wonders but let Men go with the inward into the outward for tho' the outward be a Beast yet the Wonders which have discovered themselves in a comprehensible substance belong with their figures not their substance to the inward 4. The inward understanding Spirit is Lord of the outward But if it let the outward be Lord that Man is a Beast and if it let the Fire-spirit viz. the Turba be Lord that Man is a Devil But the outward Life is Water to that Fire else how would many a Man become a Devil if the outward Life did not hinder it as is to be seen in the Gall which is a Fire Poyson but mixed with Water it allays the fierce Pomp of the Fire from going aloft above the Meekness of God as Lucifer did Q. 17. Whence and wherefore is there a contrariety of the Flesh and Spirit A. Water is a death to Fire but the contrariety is not totally such in Man because the Light ever causeth the Fire but rather such as between God and Hell for the Anger Fire sharpeneth the Divine hiddenness of Gods Eternal Majesty for it generateth the high Light in the free Liberty and thus the other or second World cometh to be out of the first The Soul is the Centre of Nature The Spirit is the precious Image tho' not sever'd as Fire and Light are not sever'd the Fire is fierce yet the cause of the Meek Light and in the Light is the Life The contrariety is that the inward Spirit hath Gods Body out of the meek substantiality the outward Spirit hath the great Wonders which lye in the Arcanum of the Souls â—ternness therefore the Love spirit hindereth that the fierce wrath destroyeth not the Soul bâ— inflaming it The contrariety is that the inward Spirit would be Lord and subdue and the outward would be Lord saying it hath the Mystery of which it hath but a Looking-glass Seek not the Mystery in the outward Spirit for there is but a Glimpse but go into the Cross and from the Cross back into the fourth Form there is Sun and Moon one in another Bring it into Anguish into Death Drive on that Magick Body so far till it be again what it was before the Centre in the will and then it is Magical and hungry after Nature it is a seeking in the Eternal seeking and would fain have a Body therefore give him for a Body Sol viz. the Soul and then it will suddenly make it a Body according to the Soul for the will sprouteth in Paradise with very fair Heavenly Fruit without spot or blemish The inward Spirit would have God the outward would have Bread which is also good in its place But beware thou let not the outward Spirit be Lord. Q. 18. How the Soul departs from the Body in the death of a Man A. There is need of the Eyes of all the three Principles to take Death Captive to see this sharp question The beginning which is Magical having found the limit casteth away the seeking the Looking-glass the Earthy Life And lets the Body depart without complaint for there is no woe done to the Soul but the Turba or Fire life the Matter or Earthy Life â—â—â—seth The Soul dwelleth in the will which hath a glance or lustre burning in it and the Fire becometh impotent and a darkness unless the Spirit hath Heavenly Substantiality if so it is swallow'd up in the Magia hath the same meek Body for a Sulphur and Eternally burneth in the Love-fire Thus Sickness unto Death is that the Turba hath kindled it self and destroyeth the introduced Medium The Life's Fire being withdrawn the Body goeth into its Aether when if the Soul's Fire hath not in its Spirit God's Body viz nothing of the Power of Humility to sink down in it self through Death into Life it is a dark Fire in great horror in the first four Forms of Nature The stern Astringency Bitterness Anguish and Fire without flaming The Covetous one hath Frost the Envious one Bitterness the falâ—e Deceitful one Anguish the Wrathful one Fire Hence consider the last Judgment to be such as at which the Devils do tremble Q. 19. How the Soul is Mortal or who it is Immortal A. The Soul is from the Eternal and continueth Eternally it came out of God's Mouth and at Death goeth into God's Mouth again But the wicked Soul hath lost its Image yet Immortal for the Eternal Nature dieth not also if the Anger Fire should die God's Majesty would extinguish which can never be The wicked Soul hath introduced a Substance into the Will thence comes wo it is a Dying yet only a Will of Dying an Anguish ever thinking if I had not done this or that I might have attained God's Salvation which Evil things done make Eternal Despair No Soul Dieth be it in God or in Hell but its Substance or Doings stand Eternally to the Glory of God's Wonders Q. 20. How the Soul comes or returns to God again A. Answer'd in the foregoing Answer Q. 21. Whither the Soul goeth when it Departeth c. be it saved or not saved A. 1. It goeth not out at the Mouth for it came not in at the Mouth but the Turba having broken the Earthy Life goes as a Conqueror unapprehended by Wood or Stone through the Anger of God and Death and then is in God's Body in Christ's Flesh and Blood seeth God's Majesty and the Angels face to face in the unsearchable World without end or limit 't is swift as a Thought is magical its words and deeds done here are â—ts House 2. The Heavenly Body of the Soul is from the pure Element out of which the four are come that gives Flesh the Tincture blood It s external substantiality is Paradise where spring all bright heavenly Fruits which the Soul may eat they are as pure as a Thought yet substantial with colours Power and palpable to be handled by the Soul Juicy full of the Water of Life 3. Only those who are gone out of their own Will into God's in this Life have Christ's Flesh on them but most go so out as by Faith hang by a thread and are in the still rest waiting for the last Judgment Day sunk down in Humility through Death yet a Cliff or Gulph is betwixt them and the Holy Souls in Christ's Flesh and Blood but are in the same Principle yet under the Altar 4. The wicked are in the innermost which is also the outermost Darkness and can appear again in the starry Spirit seeking rest make terrors in Houses
help breathing it self again into the disappear'd Divine Property and into all the three Properties of the Humane even to the Thoughts and Senses breaking the will of self and of the Devil and hath brought the holy Life through Death into a Paradisical sprouting making Death and the Devil a reproach and shewing how the Eternal one can rule mightily over the Multiplicity and give an open Grace Gate for us poor Men to enter the Life of Christ. 3. We are therefore to come with ouâ— captivated will out of the Prison of Earth and Self and solely sink down into this Incorporated Grace which pressed from one viz. the first Man upon all and with the resign'd will sink down into the Hyperbyssal Supersensual Unsearchable Eternal one into the ground out of whiâ—h Life first sprung and then it reacheth the Temperature and true Rest. Argument How can a Man do that viz. that last above written being the Scripture saith The first Man is made to a Natural Life to rule the Creatures therefore mâ—st the Life go into the Earthy Properties Answer 1. The Humane Life is set in a reflex Image of the Divine Will in and with which God willeth and the Earthy Creatures are set in a representation of the Humane 2. And though Mans Life was set in Nature yet it was in the Temperature Without Christ we can do nothing but if Man sink into the Incorporated Grace of God and in Divine Hope rest from self-will and work and resign its will to work only what God speaketh it is beyond Nature And the Abyss God himself speaketh through him and manifesteth himself in and with him thus new-born in Christ who now ruleth over the outward Reason Life 3. Till this be done Man is no Child of Heaven but his will an Apostate just as the Devil and his Body an evil Beast and gathereth not with Gods Incorporated Grace but scattereth 4. As an Herb without Sap is burnt by the Sun while the Herb that hath Sap is warn'd So if Mans Essence hath not Ens from Gods Love and Meekness it impresseth it self into a fierce wrathful fiery sharpness and the Mind is totally rough covetous envious and stinging 5. Yet if the fiery Life eat of the Divine Love it is no more receiving as the Fires Property is but giving and working good in all as the Property of the Light for having eaten of the Bread which cometh down from Heaven it is quickned by it The Sun in a hard Stone where the Water is coagulated cannot work as in Metals Herbs and Trees because his Light and Vertue penetrateth not so is it in this CHAP. III. How Nature representeth and maketh visible the Divine Eternal and Abyssal Knowledge 1. THE Word is the Efflux of the Divine Will and Knowledge as the Thoughts and Senses are of the Mind yet the Mind remaineth totally but one So the Word was is and ever will be the Eternal Beginning flowing out and revelation of the Eternal one 2. And the Wisdom is the Eternal out-flown Beginning and cause of all Powers Colours Vertues and Properties 3. Their Powers are again an Efflux into the various Self-properties whence come the Multiplicity of Wills thence the Creaturely Life of the Eternal springeth viz. Angels and Souls 4. Not that Nature and Creature is here but the Spirit of God sporteth himself in forming Similitudes of the Powers of the Wisdom as doth the Mind with reflex Images which are the Thoughts and every Property hath its own Separator as hath the Eternal Unity whereby the Efflux of the Unity becomes perceptible in Infinite Multiplicity 5. For the Efflux sharpeneth it self superlatively by the Magnetick longing of the receiving Powers in the fiery kind wherein the Eternal One becomes Majestick and Light And the inkindling through Fire makes it a Kingdom of Joy The visible World with its Hosts is the out-flown word of Fire Light and Darkness separated by the Officer of Nature who hath imprinted each Body according to its own Property Of the Twofold Life in the Representation of the Divine Will 1. An Eternal 2. A Temporal 1. The Eternal is the sensible Life in the Eternal Fire and Light a spark of the out-flown or out-breathed will of God bound to will nothing but the out-breathed will of God a Separator and Instrument of Gods Omnipotent Glory wherewith he will rule all things having therefore given it Divine Understanding 2. The Temporal and Mortal Existence is the Efflux of the Separator of all Powers call'd the Soul of the World making the visible Creatures such a Similitude as wherein the Spiritual World of Fire Light and Darkness beholdeth it self hidden in and working through the Elementary World But the Visible possesseth not the Invisible so as to be chang'd thereinto but is only an Instrument whereby the Inward Powers Image themselves as in Herbs Trees Metals c. Of the Threefold Spirit in the Growing Powers 1. The outward Spirit is the gross Brimstone Salt and Mercury which coagulating it self in the four Elements and by drawing the Spiritual Separator to it the Signature is instantly perform'd 2. The second Spirit or Quintessence hath a Centre of its own viz. a Root of the four Elements being the Meek Joy of the painful Brimstone and Salt Spirit nourished from within of the Light of Nature and from without of the subtle Power of the Spirit of the World which fifth Essence is the right cause of all Vegetation and such a Joy of Nature as the Sun to the Elements 3. The third 's the Tincture of which see Chap. 12. of the three Principles The Tincture is that wherein all Powers lye in equality a Spiritual Fire and Light in one substance a Paradise the Mansion of Divine Power and of the Eternal Soul known to the Creature only in the Regeneration and to no ungodly one for such drive on a false will 4. It is not Elementary but issueth through the gross Elementary Spirit even into Taste and Smell But the Elements are a cause of the motion of the Tincture the sharpness of the Smell is Elementary but the vertue in the Smell is the Tincture which in Medicines Cureth for it imprinteth it self in such Balsams 5. As the voice to the Fig-tree Be thou withered did not that Miracle but the Power whence the voice proceeded As neither is the Confession of a thing Faith but that Intellectual Power is Faith out of which the Confession proceedeth wherewith Gods Spirit Co-worketh 6. Thus all whatsoever whether evil or good represent in their several Properties the hidden Spirit of the Separator of all things and the Elementary is the Efflux of the Tincture and Spiritual World for the visible moveable material World is the substance of the invisible immoveable spiritual World 7. So the desire of the Efflux out of the darkness is become sharp stern and gross and hath coagulated it self into Matter even unto the drossy Earth So out of the Light cometh the Noble
the Oleous and Love Property a sweet Spiritual Essence pleasant smell in the Fire and Light the one Element in the lustre it gives the precious Tincture in the Salnitral flagrat is the sude of growth and pullulation it also holds Sulphur and Mercury from severing from each other yet in the Salnitral flagrat they pass into the four Elements 9. The Properties are as so many hungry Desires eating of their several likenesses the hunger of Time eateth of Time and that of Eternity of Eternity but Man's Original being from two Principles may by dying to the dark Self-hood bring his hunger into God's Kingdom and feast with the five Divine Senses on the Divine Mercury Yet so great was our Fall that the outward Man apprehends this only by Imagination though the inward Man penetrateth it as the Sun doth Water which yet remaineth Water CHAP. XV. How in the Will of the great Mystery a Good and Evil Will ariseth and the one introduceth it self into the other 1. THE great Mystery was from Eternity whence the one Element which also was from Eternity proceeded in the Motion whereof the free Lubet of Eternity proceeded as a Spirit which Spirit is Gods 2. And in or from the desire to Nature the Properties proceeded having their Root in the great Mystery as Air out of Fire uncontroulably and incorruptibly 3. In the desire of Essence in the one Element arose the four Elements with manifold Wills whence variety and contrariety came as Heat and Cold Fire and Water c. each a Death to the other all things under that Dominion are in a continual strife dying and Enmity no other way to be remedied but by the Death of the Multiplicity of Wills and Resignation of all Self Wills and Lust to the one Will viz. the one Element the right of Eternity a dying to Self-fulness and Lust which like a disobedient Child striveth against its Mother and is its own Enemy and Destroyer unless Mortified in the Death of the Lord Jesus 4. The resign'd Will is not at all careful save only to bring its desire into its Eternal Mother and united with her be it self a Nothing this the Self-will calls foolishness but the resign'd Will doth as a potent Champion continually bruise the Serpents head 5. The Elemental and Sydereal Man is only the Instrument wherewith Man's Soul laboureth in the resigned Will for thereto it was Created but the Soul in Adam makes it Lord and Master 6. The resigned Will hath no rest in this Cottage but is still in Combat and the good Angels defend him from Satan's fiery Darts v. 25. The Doctrines of Christ's Satisfaction which teach not also the Death to Self in Man and resigning of the Will in Obedience as a new-born Child are flattery and words from without not in the Speaking Voice of God Christ's Dove which teacheth the bearing Fruit in Patience budding forth always as a fair Flower out of the Earth 7. The knowing Doctor and Disputant attaineth not as such what the humble Herdsman by dying to his false Will doth for a Christian is the most simple and plain Man upon Earth having nothing of his own to lose all being given up already nor any thing to seek for himself but for the Lord being dead to himself what he possesseth as an ownhood is only as a Steward Servant or Distributer 8. But all arrogated Authority which is introduced to self-hood and extraduced it self quite from God is Sacrilegious The self-will generates it a Form according to the prevalency impressing most vigorously in the enmity of his inâ—â—re depraved Nature both inward and outward But the resigned Will is formed by the Model of Eternity as an Instrument of Musick into the Love-harmony where is no Turba but the end of Nature Rest whence first it sprung a meer ravishing delight of all the Senses where God is all in all CHAP. XVI Of the Eternal Signature and Heavenly Joy and why were produced Good and Evil. 1. WHAT God is in his Eternal uninchoative Generation that is also the Creation not in Omnipotence but like an Apple which is not the Tree to manifest the Glory which was in the Eternal Mystery As one only Air melodiseth variously in several Pipes and Organs sounding also in each Note in some pleasant in other harsh Thus in Eternity is one only Spirit the Manifester of all the Works of God 2. The seven Superior Stars and all the lesser as so many Kingdoms figure the Angelical Principalities and most Inferior Existences as one Clockwork 3. Let none therefore blame the Creator as if he made it Evil for the Creatures departure from the equal accord makes that Evil which was very Good as did Lucifer who leaving the Harmony brought him to the cold dark Fire out of which is the hot Fires Generation In the Holy he is Holy so Angels and Men praise him in the might of Love and Devils praise him in the might of Wrath God's Wrath is his Joy not as if he lived in impotency but in Fiery Might as a Potent King in the dark Principle in trembling Anguish So in the Divine Angelical Creatures is a trembling Joyfulness in the Holy Light and Fire of Love 4. Thus is all a Fire in their severed Properties the one the Poison and Death to the other yet if there were no Wrath there would be no Love as no Fire no Light 5. God is himself-all but called God only according to the Light of Love but in the Darkness a consuming Fire 6. The Creature when departed out of the first Harmony becomes an Enemy to the Being of all Beings â—ven Hell and Nature in the Wrath Property is the Devils Enemy for that he would be Lord in that wherein he was not created 7. Every Spirit of Angels and Man was created out of the two Eternal Principles of Love and Anger Light and Darkness in equal weight and may take to it self a Lubet either of Good or Evil and what Property the Will-spirit of the Creature awakeneth by that it is ruled for dying to the one it liveth to the other 8. He is elected that dyeth to Sin in Christ's Death and by Divine earnest Desire breaking the Sinful Will so persevereth as by the new birth to rise in Christ's Resurrection Christ calleth to gather as the Hen her Chickens but they would not 't is not said they could not He that blameth God despiseth his Mercy introduced by him into the Humanity and bringeth Judgment on his own Soul and Body Gods Election of Grace CALLED Predestination CHAP. I. What the Only God is or the Sole Will what it is 1. THE Abyssal Will is the Father The conceiv'd innate Will of the Abyss the Son 2. The Exit of the Abyss through the conceived Ens the Holy Spirit 3. The Lord our God is One only God that neither willeth nor can will Evil for if he did there were a Rent in him and some cause of Contrariety
who appeared to Abraham in the Plain of Mamre c. 1. THE three Men signified the Trinity in highest Humility In the heat of the Day when the Humanity was enflam'd with highest Rage under God's Indignation Appear'd to Abraham viz. to Adam's Children in the Souls Tent. Abraham bow'd himself viz. in his Faith 's Ens. The three Measures of Meal the three Principles or three Worlds in Man and kneaded the Heavenly Humanity must be mixed with ours The tender Calf the Limus of the Earth which is as a Beast before God 2. The Lord asked for Sarah he said she is in the Tent viz. covered with earthiness that is sees not who is with me Sarah laughed and fearing lyed the Figure of Eve CHAP. XLIII Of the Ruin of Sodom and Gomorrah how foretold to Abraham 1. GOD saith I am come down to see if the Sin of Sodom be so great as the cry of it which is come up viz. God according to the Property of the Anger seeth in the Devils and false Souls but his Love-eye seeth not into the Apostate Souls 2. Reason knows not what God is nor where he dwells God is every Essence and dwelleth through every Essence but possesseth no Locality nor doth need space for Habitation 3. But as far as he is called God is no Essence but through all things and giveth himself in an Energetical way but worketh not from without into it but from within out of it to his Manifestation 4. The cry going up and God's coming down is thus 5. Inward is above outward is below the Angelical World is said to be above and the formed outward below as when a Fire is kindled the light is above the substance or matter below 6. For the being within without the substance is the being above 7. Abraham's Praying for Sodom shews Abraham to be a figure of Christ withholding the severe Righteousness from falling on Man but there were only three capable of Mercy 8. And whereas there went but two Angels towards Sodom viz. not the Person of Christ but God's Truth and Righteousness The Truth brought out Lot and the Righteousness remained in Sodom 9. Lot knew them and bowed humbling himself before the Lord but they at first denied to go in with him because his Wife by whom the earthy Matrix is signified could not go through the Judgment 10. The Men bid Lot call all his together but his Sons that were to Marry his Daughters would not for the wrath in them was so strong as to withhold though the Truth drew them as it did also Lots Wife by which she was transmuted as a terrible Example till the last Judgment CHAP. XLIV Of Lot's Departure out of Sodom and the terrible overthrow of that whole Region 1. THE Angels took Lot his Wife and Daughters by the Hand they were inwardly taken by the hand of Faith in the Covenant So were the Men of Sodom taken by the hand of their Essence and brought into Judgment and Execution 2. The Sun was Externally risen so was Internally the Sun of God's Truth the Sun of the Covenant on Lot and the scorching Sun of God's Anger on Sodom This figure concerns Babel 3. Lot obtain'd the saving of Zoar and himself in it as oftentimes God's Children do with-hold great Plagues from falling on People The Angel saith I can do nothing till thou come thither God's Anger becomes impotent as it were where the Sons of Love are present It rained Brimstone and Fire from the Lord c. 4. It was not the Hellish Fire which at the End shall purge the Floor if so the four Elements had been changed for that inward Fire consumes Earth Stones and Elements but this Fire was generated in Turba Magna an Egest or Thunder-clap And though it be no palpable Matter yet is a spiritual Substance in which Mercurius doth enkindle and there the flagrat doth fix itself into a Substance 5. The first Principle did behold the third with a darting flash or aspect As if the inward dark spiritual World should move itself the outward with the four Elements would forthwith be swallow'd up 6. Lot's Wife was apprehended in the Proba and remain'd in the Salt Spirit for that Covetousness was most predominant in her 7. Lot's Daughters caus'd him to drink Wine and lay with him that they might receive the Holy Seed which is not so as reason censureth but that Ammon and Moab might spring from one Root in Affinity with Abraham's Line CHAP. XLV How God defended Abraham and Sarah 1. ABraham's continual Travels figureth Christianity which goeth from place to place as a Stranger without any continuing abode 2. His being still protected sheweth the particular care of God still as then over every one of his Children 3. His being faint and timorous when he came to Pharoah and Abimelech shews we are not to go in our Strength Abraham's Will of self looking only on itself was dismay'd yet in him was the great Might over all Powers but it belonged not to the Human Ownhood neither doth Christ in his Children belong to the Human Ownhood but to the humble resign'd Will. 4. So in Abraham and in all Christians are a twofold Will one of this World always standing in fear the other according to the second Principle the Kingdom of Heaven the poor captive Soul's Will which immerseth its self into God's Mercy in Hope CHAP. XLVI Of Isaac's Birth and casting out Ismael and Hagar and what it means 1. Lot being out and Sodom destroyed Abraham removed shewing that where Christ's Kingdom is corrupt he will depart 2. He lived under King Abimelech viz. the Man of ingenious reason At Gâ—rar viz. the austere Life of Nature 3. In this removal Abraham followed his reason Reason-light is the winnowing cross of God's Children this brought his Fear also his Reproof from Abimelech whom he should have Taught 4. God's Children are in themselves weak as all others yet not to be rejected for the Cross always stands by them as Abimelech by Abraham Ismael by Isaac Hagar by Sarah 5. Sarah ejects her and she wanders in the Wilderness of brokenness of Heart then gave her Self and Son to die but the Angel comforts her That is in the Figure 6. When Christ is Born in the Convert the new-born Will rejecteth its own evil Nature the Mocker then doth the poor forsaken Nature wander and give up itself to Death till the Angel comes and comforts it that is some faithful upright Man or some beam of Light from Christ in the Heart to give Living Water for of this Child must come a Nation Christ must be Born as a fair blossom out of the wild Earth 7. These precious Figures have remained speechless to the World because of Man's Vanity but now the Mystery of the Kingdom of God shall be finished and the Child of Perdition be revealed Man's unworthiness causeth Truth to be hidden wherefore it was Christ preach'd in Parables 8
John Page 132 Why he was Tempted 40 Days Page 133 How he was in Heaven and also on Earth Page 134 Why he Taught in Parables Page 134 Why he did not describe his Gostel in Writing Page 135 Why the High Priest and Scripture-Learned persecuted him Page 135. 139 His Process through his Suffering and why it was so Page 136. 142. 283. 330. 332. Why must he Die on a wooden Cross. Page 140 Of the two Murtherers Crucified with Christ what they figure Page 140. 283 Why must his Side be opened with a Spear Page 141 Why did the Earth tremble when he hung on the Cross. Page 142 What did the darkness signifie that came over all Nature Page 143 Of Christs Dying Descending c. from Page 143. to 158. and 283 Of the true Christian. Page 170 176. 297 Of the Titulary Christian. Page 171. 176 297. 310. Of the True Christian Church Page 279 Circumcision what it signifies Page 116. 376. 398 Conversion what it is Page 324 Contrariety whence it sprung Page 340 What use it is of Page 349 357 Of the Covenant with Noah Page 391 Of the Covenant with Abraham Page 116. 397 Of the Line of the Covenant Page 391 Of the Mortal Creatures from whence they sprung and Exist Page 64. 72. 233. 242 Of their Differences Page 73. 235 The End why they were Created Page 74. 235 Of the Creation Page 19. 234. 252. 303. 371. 381. What was before the Creation Page 43 Of the inward and outward Cure Page 363 Of Gods Curse what it is Page 275 The Cause thereof Page 388 D. OF the two Principles of Darkness and Light Page 1 Of the Temporal Darkness whence it is Page 65. 227 How the Devil came to be and what he is Page 45 Of Death and Dying Page 191. 192. 277. 313. 321. 358. Of the Divine Nature Page 260 Of the Divine Being in Nature Page 241. 380 The Divine Being and Nature distinguished Page 337. 341 Dinah deflowered what it figureth Page 412 E. WHat the Earth was before the Curse Page 87. 106 What the Earth is since the Curse Page 106 Of the Constitution and Form of the Earth Page 253 Egypt The bringing the Children of Israel out thence what figure it bears Page 121 Of Election and Reprobation what they are Page 345 What the four Elements are and whence proceeded Page 62. 224. 263. Of Enoch's Wonderful Line Page 391 Of the Enochian Life what it is and where hath Enoch remained Page 113. 326 The History of Esau what it figureth Page 405 to 413 Of the Eternal Nature or Originality Page 286 Of the infinite Productions thereof Page 261 Of the Knowledge of the Eternal through the Corruptible Page 272 Of Evil fierceness and anger whence they proceeded Page 2. 223. 247. 334. 380. F. TRue Faith what it is Page 332 Of the Fathers Property Page 243 Of the Firmament in the midst of the Waters Page 66. 228 254 Of the Flesh and Blood of Christ how the Disciples did Eat and Drink it Page 377 Of the Flesh and Spirit the contrariety betwixt them Page 321 Of the forbidden Fruit what it was Page 99 Of the Forms of Nature Page 292 How God Forgiveth Sins Page 336 G. IN what Grace the old World was Saved without Law Page 110 Of God distinct from Nature and Creature Page 42. 369. 379 Of Gods Love and Anger Page 42 Of Gods being All in All. Page 201 Of Gods working in Hell Page 54. 55. 220 Of the Word or Heart of God Page 379 Of Gods Voice when the day grew cool Page 104 Of Good and Evil whence they proceeded Page 334. 366. 380. H. OF the Human Tree Page 390. 393 Of the Hand of God what it is that Christ commended his Soul into Page 144. Of Heaven what it is where it is and how Page 56. 158. 213. 221. 252 Of Hell its beginning continuance and place Page 47. 51. 55. 213. 219. 220. 263. Of the Heathenish Gods whence they sprung Page 396 Of Hagar and Ishmael what their History figureth Page 397 to 400 Of the shedding forth the Holy Ghost after Christs Ascension what it benefits us Page 163 J. THE History of Jacob and Esau what it figureth Page 405 The Vision of Jacob's Ladder Page 407 The rest of the History of Jacob to Page 423 Of Jehovah Page 19 The Image of God in Man what it is Page 78. 238. 245. 273. 316 The History of Joseph what it figureth from Page 413 to 423. Concerning John Baptist what he was Page 125 Of Isaac's Birth and casting out Ishmael what it figureth Page 400 405 Of Judah and Thamar Page 414 Of the last Judgment what it is and how effected Page 195. 285 K. THE Kingdom of Christ how it is assumed or taken by him Page 183 How Christ will deliver the Kingdom to the Father Page 346 L. COncerning Lamech Cain's Successor Page 112 Of the Language of Nature Page 295. 395 Of the Language spoke by the Apostles at Pentecost Page 162 What the Law is Page 122 How the Divine Life may be manifested in this Life Page 350 Of the Life of Darkness what it is Page 343 Of the Principles of Light and Darkness Page 1 Of the true and false Light Page 354 Of the Temporal Light and Darkness Page 65. 227 Lot's Wife becoming a Pillar of Salt what it figureth Page 118 Of his departure out of Sodom Page 399 Of his Daughters Lying with him Page 118 What each signifies Lust what it can do Page 335 Lucifer what moved him to depart from God Page 44 45 Of his doleful Fall Page 250. 359 Of his Office in Hell Page 47. 219 Of his place at present Page 257 M. OF Mans Estate before the Fall Page 21. 82 84. 85. 86. 274 By what Degrees Man fell Page 26. 274. 359. 372. 385 What Mans Estate is by the Fall Page 28. 83. 274. 290. 335. 342. 373. 388 Of Mans Recovery Page 30. 38. 39. 40. 170 Mans mistaken way towards a supposed Happiness Page 37 Of Mans Immortal Life Page 77. 81. 237 Of Mans Mortal Life Page 77. 81. 237. 255. The Difference of the Heavenly and Earthy Man Page 382 Mans Body whence derived Page 75. 237. 255. 264. Of Mans Birth and Propagation Page 271 Why but one Man Created in the Beginning Page 81 Of the Government of Man over the Creatures Page 92 Why the first Man born of a Woman was a Murtherer Page 106 How Man may find himself and all Mysteries Page 303. 342 Of Mans deep Ground and Knowledge Page 46. 299. 304. 343. 358. 372. Of Mans Threefold Life Page 288. 301 Of the Male and Female kind whence proceeded Page 67. 229. Magia what it is and doth Page 346 Of Natural Magick what it is Page 417 Concerning the Metals Page 358 Of the Mind Page 273 Of the strife between Michael and the Dragon what it is Page 45 Moses what doth his being drawn out of the River signifie Page 119 Why the Lord appeared to him in
contradict Christ and would readily mock him and condemn him continually to Death Why must not the worldly Magistracy do it or the common People What doth that signifie A. 1. The worldly Magistracy expect Civil Duty and Obedience their grandeur is their Idol and having the outward Obeysance and worldly Advantage it sufficeth 2. The common People expect moral Justice and common Honesty and finding that are quiet especially if no bait of Profit by Treachery offer to accrue to them 3. Now Christ's Disciples in imitation of their Lord whose Kingdom was not of this World do submit to Magistracy in all civil Concerns grudge them not Civil Honour and all the Profits they can reasonably challenge and all this for Conscienâ—e sake 4 Aâ—so to the common people they give readily what commutative Justice guides to and have a propenseness to more viz. to be Good as well as Just to give and forgive wherewith the common people are not only satisfied but though in their tempers brutish and dogged are often obliged to Peace and Gratitude And as for Profit by abusing Christ's Followers there is usually little for the Cross and Poverty is their portion here as it was their Lord's and his first and eminent Followers 5. Therefore though Herod on the Wise-mens Enquiry was by mistake afraid of Christ left the new-born King should supplant him of his Regality the latter Herod and his Men of War set the Lord at nought and what the common people did in their Acclamations against Christ was by the inciâ—ement of the Priests c. 6. Now why the High Priests and Scribes or Scripture learned were Christ's cruel Persecutors was grounded on and proceeded from the following Maxims offer'd to Consideration The nearer one approacheth a much desired Object the more hot and sharp is the Desire He of two Rivals for one excellent thing that misseth it utterly his Desperation is Anguish at his own falling short and Envy at the succeâ—s of the other The contrariety of Darkness to Light moves the Workers Hate of being detected The Expulsion and final loss of the possession of an Inestimable Good is the highest provocation to Rage 7. These things duly weighed shew why the High Priests and Scripture-learned were the Lord s implacable Enemies sharpest hottest and most furious Persecutors even to Death 8. From Gain the first False cruel Worshipper till then Christ as Christ Truth and Integrity met no such Adversaries among Mankind as the Apostates pretending to the true Worship and from that day till now none so real haters of the humble Children of the day as the Blind Zealots making themselves believe they are doing God Service by destroying those who bear the most express Characters of His Divine Image They Kiâ—s and Betray and are muster'd by the Craft and Malice of the fallen Angels and make up the Antichrist concerning whom I may not here enlarge nor character him because whoever God shall use to answer the 162 Question will meet it as the only Enquiry there made Q. 117. Why must there be such a way and Process observed towards Christ with Mockings Reproaching Derision or Scorn and Scourging before his Passion Why did God suffer that to be so done A. In regard none of the Questions past nor behind lead to the opening the whole Process of Christ as doth this I may be permitted to digress by way of Retrospect from the present part of the Process this Question â—earcheth after yet not so far back as the Conception and Incarnation whereof Jacob Behmen's Book of the Incarnation discourseth as doth the 21st Chapter of the Considerations of c. But what is here intended is only the Mysteries of His Infancy Circumcision and Flight into Egypt 2. Of His Youth 3. Of His Thirty Years Privacy and then come to the present Disquisition 1 The Mistery of his Infancy Circumcision and Flight wherein we must see his Sufferings 1. Privatively 1. His divesting Self-emptying deep humbling and becoming only as an Object of Compassion Pity and Charity as are Infants figur'd by Isaac who went as his Father willed by Submission not by Choice 2. His proceeding into a state of Ignorance or Nescience to be guided and guarded by others who were to monish His Danger and prevent it from Herod Particularly he was 1. as wholly unknowing in the first Principle viz. The Jealousie Subtlety and Cruelty of Herod and to ward that stroke is fully resigned to the Father by the ministration of Angels 2. He was as wholly ignorant in the third Principle viz. Whither to fly and how to be furnished for the Charge incident to a Necessary Flight and constrained Exile unto which the Presents of the Eastern Magi seem to furnish Joseph and the Virgin 3. Positively His becoming Wretched 1. By taking on him our naked helpless shiftless state for Man's Fall renders his Offspring the Epitome of Misery and Nakedness more than the rest of the Creatures who all bring their Clothing with them 2. Wretched by Suffering as was the Circumcision requiring Patience and the Danger in the Flight requiring Resignation 4. Thus this Child-like state as it consists of Simplicity Humility Innocency and unspotted Purity is the absolute Universal Refuge and Retreat of all that enter the Kingdom of God as the Lord saith Except ye be converted and become as little Children ye shall not enter c. For the top of the Gate entring into Glory is so low that only the humble stoop so low kneel creep and enter and none else 5. We see a Child a stranger to the griping Covetousness Pride Envy and Rage of the first Principle So is the truely new-born Christian. It is also careless of heaping up the Infant wills no more than the wants of Nature abandoning superfluity A Child takes no hurtful Impressions into the Mind to enrage the Passions through the Doors of the Sences but when the Countenance of things smile or frown their Affections of liking or dislike are disengaged and dead to them as soon as removed 6. Thus are we taught to be to praise and dispraise to flattery and contempt for the one must be as a Song to a Child at once ended and forgotten the other as the snarling of Dogs in an outer Court which concern us not for neither the Wrath of the first fierce hellish Forms nor the lying Cheats of the third Principle are less dangerous where prevalent than Fire or Water getting mastery 7. Thus is the Infancy of this blessed Babe such a Mystery as teacheth Divine living Doctrine and is the impregnable Fort or Bulwark which Hell hath ever in vain besieged for while we keep faithful to this holy integrity our peace is perfect 8. The second Mystery is that of his younger Years or Youth wherein we behold and learn his Patience and Subjection or Obedience The true root of Patience is Humility the root of right Subjection is Reverence and of Obedience is Love
doing what it would is not from its Wisdom but the Heavens Contra conjunctions 4. But if it be restrain'd from Sin that is not by the Aâ—tral Aspects but by the Regeneration whose strife cannot yet swallow up the earthy but the fire is sometimes blown up again 5. So great is our Misery Let none be secure for sometimes the whole Man running to Evil loseth the Pearl 6. The Soul is bound with two Chains the one is the root of its original Poison and Anger remediable only by him who is Love it self the other that of the Flesh and Blood and Region of the Stars therefore God assumed a Human Soul from ours and a new heavenly Body like to our glorious Body before the Fall and not only to cloath the Soul with it but really Unite it in the Essences and so became a Creature in all the three Principles And by separating the third passed thence by Death as a flower out of the Earth captivating Death by treading on the Head of it in the new Body 7. So by kindling the Love in the Soul captivateth the Devil in the Eternal Prison of Anger for in the Light is the Holy Trinity which the Devil neither can nor dare behold so saith Paul O Death where is thy Sting O Hell where is thy Victory 8. The causes why Christ must not only die but in so many sorts suffer are as follow Man's Fall made all the Essences of the first four Forms predominant so that had not the Eternal Word given it self into the Centre of the fifth Form opening another Centre of Love the Soul in this Body had been captive in an Eternal Prison 9. And when in Jesus Christ the fourth Form came to be broken all the Forms stirred and environ'd him and in him us with Death which made the bloody Sweat and the outward Man cry Father if it be possible let this Cup pass from me 10. And as Adam by going out of the fifth Form viz. the Angelical into the fourth became the scorn of the Devils so the Pharisees who lived in the Spirit of this World must have their pleasure on Christ for a terrible Example That what we fill our Souls with becomes a substance in the figure and must come under the Judgment of God 11. And as Adam would in his Pride be like God and wear this Worlds Crown Christ must in this World be crown'd with Thorns as a false King of or in it 12. And as after Adam's entring into the Spirit of this World he had a Rib broken from his Side for a Wife so did Blood by scourging flow from Christ's Body and his blessed Side pierced and opened 13. And as Adam departed out of the Eternal Day into the Eternal Night so was Christ bound in the dark Night and carried before the angry Murtherers 14. And as Adam chang'd his Angelical for this gross Body so was Christ loaden with the heavy wooden Cross. 15. And as upon Adam's Disobedience the fierce wrathful Essences pierced him so must Christ be pierced in his Hands Feet by sharp Nails fixing him to his Cross. 16. And as when Adam's Soul entred the fourth Form the Cross-birth was stirred so hath the Man on his Brain the one half of the Cross and the Woman the other 17. And as Adam then hung between the Kingdom of Hell and this World so did Christ between the two Malefactors the one whereof was forgiven entring with Christ into Paradise 18. The great Secret The Love of God or the second Principle became Man taking the Human Soul which was out of the first viz. the Anger and Body out of the third viz. the Our-birth so there hung on the Cross all the three Principles then commending his Spirit to his Father he bowed the head and departed 19. His Father is all the Kingdom Power and Glory So the Love is his Heart and Light His Anger is his strength and darkness the Father took the Soul into the Trinity and in the Soul the loâ—t Paradise sprung up 20. And by the rising of another â—un in Death viz. in the Father's Anger the outward Sun which was generated out of the pure Element the Body of Christ loâ—t its Light 21. And at the Holy Lifes going into Death the Rocks rent And those who had put their trust in the Messiah as Patriarchs Prophets c. when Christ's Mortal had put on Immortality got their new Bodies out of Christ's Holy Body and Vertue 22. Of Christs rest in the Grave That the Soul of Christ leaving his Body in the Grave descended into Hell a great way off and there chaineâ— the Devils is nothing so For all the three Principles hung on the cross why not also reâ—â—ed in the Grave with the Body forty Hours for the Heavenly Body was not Dead but the Earthy only His Soul came with the Light into the Anger causing 〈…〉 radise to revive which made the Devils tremble and captivated them for the Light is their terror and shame 23. Of Christ's Resurrection There was no need of rolling away the Stone save to strengthen the weak Faith of his Disciples for he comprehended all things 24. He appeared a Creature in our Human Dimensions yet the fulness of the Deity was in him and his Body is the whole Princely Throne of the whole Principle without end or limit 25. As our inward Body is unlimited in the Resurrection in the Body of Christ yet visible and palpable in Heavenly Flesh and Blood and so can in the Heavenly Figure be great or little without hurt or want there being no need of compressing the Parts of that Body 26. Vain is the Contention about the Sacrament for Christ's Heavenly Flesh and Blood is really received by the Faithful and it is as great as Heaven 27. The Forty days before his Ascension of the Proba or Tryal was such a life as Adam should have liv'd having all the Principles except the four Elementary ones He shew'd himself without outward Glory did eat yet all Heavenly and Paradisical in the Mouth not into the Body and entred the Doors being shut 28. So should Adam have liv'd in and above the World above the Stars and Elements in Meekness and Divine Love without Death and Frailty 29. To this state we make some approaches when in Obedience to Christ's Laws we do Good for Evil and overcome the World by being Dead to it 30. Of Christ's Ascension Christ ascended in sight of many to shew he is our Brother Will you ask whither ascended he Into his Throne the right Hand of God that is where Love quencheth Anger and generateth Paradise in the whole Father 31. But the place of this World according to the Heavenly Principle is the Throne and Body of Christ also all the third Principle is his 32. And the Devil who dwelleth in the place of this World in the first Principle is our Christ's Captive for the Father is the band of Eternity but his Love
in the Body of Christ holdeth the Anger together with all Devils Eternal Prisoners as Darkness stands shut up before the Eternal Day CHAP. XXVI Pentecost The sending of the Holy Ghost 1. ON the seventh Day after Moses ascended the Mount was he call'd and the Lord spake with him And Christ when he was ascended into his Throne was on the ninth Day glorify'd and the Holy Ghost went forth from the Centre of the Trinity into the whole Holy Element also opened the Doors of the great Wonders 2. So that the Apostles spake with the Languages of all Nations for the Holy Ghost went out of all Essences and filled the Essences of all Men who had but an earnest desire to it 3. And the hard palpable Body of Christ was received into the Holy Ternary only the source of this World was destroy'd in Death And though he be swallow'd up as to our sight and apprehension yet shall he come again at the last Judgment Day and manifest himself in that same very Body to good and bad CHAP. XXVII Of the Last Judgment 1. AT the time before the Fire of Nature causeth every thing to dissolve melt and pass into its Aether cometh the Judge of the Living and Dead and with him the Angelical World Then all not comprehended in the Body of Christ shall howl tremble yell roar blaspheme gnaw their Tongues and would hide themselves in Holes and Caves from the Terror of the Lord. They Curse the Heavens Constellations and Stars that inclined and drew them to Evil they Curse the Earth that bare them and buried them not sooner They Curse their Parents that brought them up and had not strangled them They Curse their Priests that flattered and misled them They Curse their Superiors whose Cruelty and Evil Example influenced them They Curse their ungodly Associates that accompanied them The Tears of those they had oppressed like fiery Serpents sting them Their abused Authority Wealth and Might stand in the Tincture in the Substance of Eternity 2. The Devils also stand trembling they see how every Fire burneth in its own life in themselves they feel the Hellish Fire in the fierce Wrath. 3. The Angelical World in the Light Lustre and Brightness is as the Sun in Triumphant Hallelujahs 4. The Angelical Quire of Holy Men stand there before the Eyes of them that Murther'd Opprest and Reproacht them for the Truths sake whose Guilt like Mountains of Lead holds them down and Speechless 5. And then the King calls and enthrones all his Members And pronounceth that formidable and irrevocable Sentence on the Wicked that they depart from him c. 6. At the Moment of Departing pass away the Heavens Sun Moon Stars Earth and Elements and time shall be no more 7. Nor can the Holy Principle touch the other any more to Eternity nor conceive a Thought of the other The Parents of their wicked Offspring or Children of their wicked Parents or Relations but Eternal Joy fills surrounds and Crowns them See more in the Answer of the 30th of the 40 Questions AN APPENDIX OR THE Threefold Life in Man I. The Life of the Spirit of this World II. Of the Life of the Originality of all Essences III. Of the Regeneration and Paradisical Life 1. BY the Ternarius Sanctus in the Aurora and the three Principles is not meant Holy Earth but the Holy Body out of the Vertue of the Trinity and properly of the Gate of God the Father whence all things proceed as of one only substance 2. For in the Creation proceeds from one only Fountain good and evil life and death joy and sorrow love and hate appearing in all things especially in Man 3. So find we the Threefold Life in Man in the Gate of God the Father See we also how joy is turn'd into sorrow and again joy return'd and by the prevalence of either a substance is made according to which the Mind commanding the Thoughts and collecting them sets the Hands Mouth Feet c. to obey what the Mind willeth and though all the forms of Nature are in Man yet that which is predominant causeth all other to lye as if dead and become as a nothing 4. There are especially three forms in the Mind all superior to the outward for the Mind is anxiously desirous and can see feel smell taste and hear what the outward Senses know not 5 And if the Divine form be Paramount it is in God and the other two are as half dead 6. But the Mind can raise the Spirit of this World of Covetousness Pride c. which instantly openeth the first form out of the Eternal Indissoluble Band in falshood envy malice c. To whom therefore you yield your selves Servants his you are whether of Sin or Righteousness 7. This Life is the sowing and growing time and in the time of this Elementary Life the mind may open which of the three Principles it will but at the dissolution of the Body the Mind standeth in one only Principle having lost the Key of the other two for when the stalk is cut it is no longer a Plant but a Fruit and can stand no longer nor open no other Principle but be Eternally in that which he here kindled 8. But if God hath regenerated us to enter through the Death of Christ into his Life then hath our Immanuel who abâ—sed himself to enter into our Humanity exalted us to enter into the Holy Flesh and Image Adam lost which is out of the pure Element And then the Trinity worketh really in us and we stand in the Life Body and Property of Christ and our new Man standeth in that out of which Heaven and Paradise is generated and the Earthy Man doth but hang to it 9. Put on therefore a true earnest purpose desire and resolution which is Repentance and the Regenerator is ready deep in the Mind in the Light of Life to help the earnest Wrestler and so soweth himself as a Grain of Mustard-seed or as a Root to a new Creature and if the Souls earnestness be great the earnestness in the Regenerator is also great 10. But this is known by them only that feel and experiment how the Regenerator changeth the proud fierceness into humble Love for the new Man is not of this World but hidden in the old For the true knowledge of God is in no Man till he be Regenerate 11. Christ gave not the Flesh and Blood of his Creatures to his Disciples but the Body of the pure Element wherein God dwelleth and is present every where in all Creatures but comprized in another Principle to eat and drink under Earthy Bread and Wine And as the outward Man is Baptized of the Elemenâ—ary Water so is the new Man with the pure Element which appeareth only in the second Principle 12. No Reader understandeth this Author rightly unless he be Born of God it is not folded up in an Historical Art But as Earthy Eyes cannot see God so neither can a