(1) Here, then, is the dawn, and the coming of the sun, the moon, and the stars. Balam-Quitzé, Balam-Acab, Mahucutah, and Iqui-Balam were very happy when they saw the Morning Star. It rose first, with shining face, when it came ahead of the sun. Immediately they unwrapped the incense which they had brought from the East, and which they had planned to burn, and then they untied the three gifts which they had planned to offer.

(5) Even as distinct with less and greater lights Glimmers between the two poles of the world The Galaxy that maketh wise men doubt, Thus constellated in the depths of Mars, Those rays described the venerable sign That quadrants joining in a circle make. Here doth my memory overcome my genius; For on that cross as levin gleamed forth Christ, So that I cannot find ensample worthy; But he who takes his cross and follows Christ Again will pardon me what I omit, Seeing in that aurora lighten Christ. From horn to horn, and 'twixt the top and base, Lights were in motion, brightly scintillating As they together met and passed each other; Thus level and aslant and swift and slow We here behold, renewing still the sight, The particles of bodies long and short, Across the sunbeam move, wherewith is listed Sometimes the shade, which for their own defence People with cunning and with art contrive. And as a lute and harp, accordant strung With many strings, a dulcet tinkling make To him by whom the notes are not distinguished,

(2) Moreover, the lations of the stars approximate to the eternal circulations of the heavens, not only locally, but also in powers, and the irradiations of light. But these are moved conformably to the mandates of the celestial Gods. For the most pure, agile, and supreme part of the air, is adapted to be enkindled [ i. e. is most inflammable], so that when the Gods assent, it is immediately set on fire. And if some one thinks that certain effluxions of the celestial bodies are imparted to the air, his opinion will not be discordant with what is frequently effected by the divine art. The union, also, and sympathy of the universe, and the simultaneous motion of the most remote parts, as if they were near, and belonged to one animal, cause these signs to be sent from the Gods to men in the most luminous manner, primarily, indeed, through the heavens, but afterwards through the air.

(45) Apuleius said when describing his initiation (vide ante): "At midnight I saw the sun shining with a splendid light." The midnight sun was also part of the mystery of alchemy. It symbolized the spirit in man shining through the darkness of his human organisms. It also referred to the spiritual sun in the solar system, which the mystic could see as well at midnight as at high noon, the material earth bring powerless to obstruct the rays of this Divine orb. The mysterious lights which illuminated the temples of the Egyptian Mysteries during the nocturnal hours were said by some to he reflections of the spiritual sun gathered by the magical powers of the priests. The weird light seen ten miles below the surface of the earth by I-AM-THE-MAN in that remarkable Masonic allegory Etidorhpa (Aphrodite spelt backward) may well refer to the mysterious midnight sun of the ancient rites.

(7) Thus they spoke while they saw and invoked the coming of the sun, the arrival of day; and at the same time that they saw the rising of the sun, they contemplated the Morning Star, the Great Star, which comes ahead of the sun, that lights up the arch of the sky and the surface of the earth, and illuminates the steps of the men who had been created and made.

(4) But what slipped from our view in the midst of our discourse, the Good is Cause of the celestial movements in their commencements and terminations, of their not increasing, not diminishing, and completely changeless, course, and of the noiseless movements, if one may so speak, of the vast celestial transit, and of the astral orders, and the beauties and lights, and stabilities, and the progressive swift motion of certain stars, and of the periodical return of the two luminaries, which the Oracles call "great," from the same to the same quarter, after which our days and nights being marked, and months and years being measured, mark and number and arrange and comprehend the circular movements of time and things temporal. But, what would any one say of the very ray of the sun? For the light is from the Good, and an image of the Goodness, wherefore also the Good is celebrated under the name of Light; as in a portrait the original is manifested. For, as the goodness of the Deity, beyond all, permeates from the highest and most honoured substances even to the lowest, and yet is above all, neither the foremost outstripping its superiority, nor the things below eluding its grasp, but it both enlightens all that are capable, and forms and enlivens, and grasps, and perfects, and is measure of things existing, and age, and number, and order, and grasp, and cause, and end; so, too, the brilliant likeness of the Divine Goodness, this our great sun, wholly bright and ever luminous, as a most distant echo of the Good, both enlightens whatever is capable of participating in it, and possesses the light in the highest degree of purity, unfolding to the visible universe, above and beneath, the splendours of its own rays, and if anything does not participate in them, this is not owing to the inertness or deficiency of its distribution of light, but is owing to the inaptitude for light-reception of the things which do not unfold themselves for the participation of light. No doubt the ray passing over many things in such condition, enlightens the things after them, and there is no visible thing which it does not reach, with the surpassing greatness of its own splendour. Further also, it contributes to the generation of sensible bodies, and moves them to life, and nourishes, and increases, and perfects, and purifies and renews; and the light is both measure and number of hours, days, and all our time. For it is the light itself, even though it was then without form, which the divine Moses declared to have fixed that first Triad of our days. And, just as Goodness turns all things to Itself, and is chief collector of things scattered, as One-springing and One-making Deity, and all things aspire to It, as Source and Bond and End, and it is the Good, as the Oracles say, from Which all things subsisted, and are being brought into being by an all-perfect Cause; and in Which all things consisted, as guarded and governed in an all-controlling route; and to Which all things are turned, as to their own proper end; and to Which all aspire --the intellectual and rational indeed, through knowledge, and the sensible through the senses, and those bereft of sensible perception by the innate movement of the aspiration after life, and those without life, and merely being, by their aptitude for mere substantial participation; after the same method of its illustrious original, the light also collects and turns to itself all things existing--things with sight -- things with motion--things enlightened--things heated--things wholly held together by its brilliant splendours--whence also, Helios, because it makes all things altogether (ἀολλῆ), and collects things scattered. And all creatures, endowed with sensible perceptions, aspire to it, as aspiring either to see, or to be moved and enlightened, and heated, and to be wholly held together by the light. By no means do I affirm, after the statement of antiquity, that as being God and Creator of the universe, the sun, by itself, governs the luminous world, but that the invisible things of God are clearly seen from the foundation of the world, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Deity.

(18) I saw there seven stars like great burning mountains, and to me, when I inquired regarding them,

(63) These powers of the stars and elements, did the Creator, after the horrible fall of Lucifer's kingdom, bring together again into the same order as that in which the kingdom of the angels stood in the divine pomp before this fall. Sparrow's original rendering.

(33) And I saw how the stars of heaven come forth, and I counted the portals out of which they proceed, and wrote down all their outlets, of each individual star by itself, according to their number and their names, their courses and their positions, and their times and their months, as Uriel the holy angel who was with me showed me.

(57) Isaac Myer has stated: "The Pythagoreans held that each star was a world having its own atmosphere, with an immense extent surrounding it, of aether." (See The Qabbalah.) The disciples of Pythagoras also highly revered the planet Venus, because it was the only planet bright enough to cast a shadow. As the morning star, Venus is visible before sunrise, and as the evening star it shines forth immediately after sunset. Because of these qualities, a number of names have been given to it by the ancients. Being visible in the sky at sunset, it was called vesper, and as it arose before the sun, it was called the false light, the star of the morning, or Lucifer, which means the light-bearer. Because of this relation to the sun, the planet was also referred to as Venus, Astarte, Aphrodite, Isis, and The Mother of the Gods. It is possible that: at some seasons of the year in certain latitudes the fact that Venus was a crescent could be detected without the aid of a telescope. This would account for the crescent which is often seen in connection with the goddesses of antiquity, the stories of which do not agree with the phases of the moon. The accurate knowledge which Pythagoras possessed concerning astronomy he undoubtedly secured in the Egyptian temples, for their priests understood the true relationship of the heavenly bodies many thousands of years before that knowledge was revealed to the uninitiated world. The fact that the knowledge he acquired in the temples enabled him to make assertions requiring two thousand years to check proves why Plato and Aristotle so highly esteemed the profundity of the ancient Mysteries. In the midst of comparative scientific ignorance, and without the aid of any modern instruments, the priest-philosophers had discovered the true fundamentals of universal dynamics.

(1) Already had the sun the horizon reached Whose circle of meridian covers o'er Jerusalem with its most lofty point, And night that opposite to him revolves Was issuing forth from Ganges with the Scales That fall from out her hand when she exceedeth; So that the white and the vermilion cheeks Of beautiful Aurora, where I was, By too great age were changing into orange. We still were on the border of the sea, Like people who are thinking of their road, Who go in heart and with the body stay; And lo! as when, upon the approach of morning, Through the gross vapours Mars grows fiery red Down in the West upon the ocean floor, Appeared to me—may I again behold it!— A light along the sea so swiftly coming, Its motion by no flight of wing is equalled; From which when I a little had withdrawn Mine eyes, that I might question my Conductor, Again I saw it brighter grown and larger. Then on each side of it appeared to me I knew not what of white, and underneath it Little by little there came forth another.

(3) That flowed forth and went towards the sun. And that forms what we call the dark (krishna) light of the sun.

(19) And the Light of the Sun is as it were a God in the Nature of this World, and by its Virtue [and Influence] it continually kindles the Stars [or Constellations] whereby the Stars [or Constellations] (which are of a very terrible and anguishing Essence) continually exult in Triumph very joyfully. For it [the Sun] is an Essence like the Light of God, which kindles and enlightens the dark Mind of the Father, from whence, by the Light, there arises the divine Joy in the Father.

(129) And of the Solar Circles, and of the Lunar, clashings, and of the Aërial Recesses; the Melody of Ether, and of the Sun, and of the phases of the Moon, and of the Air.

(3) That flowed forth, and went towards the sun. And that forms what we call the extreme dark (parah krishnam) light of the sun.

(41) And I saw the chambers of the sun and moon, whence they proceed and whither they come again, and their glorious return, and how one is superior to the other, and their stately orbit, and how they do not leave their orbit, and they add nothing to their orbit and they take nothing from it, and they keep faith with each other, in accordance with the oath by which they are bound together.

(1) Let him imagine, who would well conceive What now I saw, and let him while I speak Retain the image as a steadfast rock, The fifteen stars, that in their divers regions The sky enliven with a light so great That it transcends all clusters of the air; Let him the Wain imagine unto which Our vault of heaven sufficeth night and day, So that in turning of its pole it fails not; Let him the mouth imagine of the horn That in the point beginneth of the axis Round about which the primal wheel revolves,— To have fashioned of themselves two signs in heaven, Like unto that which Minos' daughter made, The moment when she felt the frost of death; And one to have its rays within the other, And both to whirl themselves in such a manner That one should forward go, the other backward; And he will have some shadowing forth of that True constellation and the double dance That circled round the point at which I was; Because it is as much beyond our wont, As swifter than the motion of the Chiana Moveth the heaven that all the rest outspeeds.

(43) Now consider further the circle or sphere of the stars, they denote the various powers and wisdom of the Father, and they also are made by the power and wisdom of the Father.

(38) Where then the King (viz. the Light of the Sun) is so very joyful in the Spirit, and does so highly triumph, exult, and rejoice, that he moves all the Essences of the Stars, and brings them into their highest Degree, to generate her; where then all Centers of the Stars fly open, and the loving Virgin beholds herself in them. Where then the Essences of the Soul (in the Light of the Virgin) can see in the Centers of the Stars, what is in its Original and Source.

(3) And what was born from it that was Âditya, the sun. When he was born shouts of hurrah arose, and all beings arose, and all things which they desired. Therefore whenever the sun rises and sets, shouts of hurrah arise, and all beings arise, and all things which they desire.