(91) Thus also the Temptation was to try, which Kingdom in the Soul might overcome, and therefore the Food and Drink was withdrawn from the earthly Body, and the Kingdom of Heaven was predominant in him, in the holy Ternary, and in his Deity, and the Kingdom of Wrath and the Kingdom of the Devil were against him. And there the new-washed and half-regenerated Soul stood in the Midst, and was pulled at by both Kingdoms, as Adam in Paradise.

(108) When in this qualifying or acting they had generated the spirit of Lucifer, then the life of the spirit, which riseth up in the water, as also the light, became very sour and sharp.

(60) And the angel of peace who was with me said to me: 'These two monsters, prepared conformably to the greatness of God, shall feed . . .

(7) Then my soul was so afflicted in anxiety, as if it were captivated by the devil, whereby reason gat so many checks and assaults, as if the body were presently to be destroyed or ruined, and the [my] spirit would not give over, till it brake through again, through the dead or mortal reason, and so has burst open the door of darkness, and has gotten its seat again in the stead thereof, whereby it gat new life and power again.

(16) Now these are the foods with which the devil lies in wait for us. First he injects a pain into your heart until you have heartache on account of a small thing of this life, and he seizes (you) with his poisons. And afterward (he injects) the desire of a tunic, so that you will pride yourself in it, and love of money, pride, vanity, envy that rivals another envy, beauty of body, fraudulence. The greatest of all these are ignorance and ease.

(2) "Then the demon will depart with faith. And then he will appear in the four regions of the world. And when faith appears in the last likeness, then will her appearance become manifest. For the firstborn is the demon who appeared in the union of nature with many faces, that faith might appear in him. For when he appears in the world, evil passions will arise, and earthquakes, and wars, and famines, and blasphemies. For because of him the whole world will be disturbed. He will seek the power of faith and light; he will not find it. For at that time the other demon will appear upon the river to baptize with an imperfect baptism, and to trouble the world with a bondage of water. But it is necessary for me to appear in the members of the thought of faith to reveal the great things of my power. I shall separate it from the demon, who is Soldas. And the light that he possesses from the spirit I shall mix with my invincible garment, as well as him whom I shall reveal in the darkness for your sake and for the sake of your race, which will be protected from the evil darkness.

(609) Consider, I said, Glaucon, that even the badness of food, whether staleness, decomposition, or any other bad quality, when confined to the actual food, is not supposed to destroy the body; although, if the badness of food communicates corruption to the body, then we should say that the body has been destroyed by a corruption of itself, which is disease, brought on by this; but that the body, being one thing, can be destroyed by the badness of food, which is another, and which does not engender any natural infection—this we shall absolutely deny? Very true. And, on the same principle, unless some bodily evil can produce an evil of the soul, we must not suppose that the soul, which is one thing, can be dissolved by any merely external evil which belongs to another? Yes, he said, there is reason in that. Either, then, let us refute this conclusion, or, while it remains unrefuted, let us never say that fever, or any other disease, or the knife put to the throat, or even the cutting up of the whole body into the minutest pieces, can destroy the soul, until she herself is proved to become more unholy or unrighteous in consequence of these things being done to the body; but that the soul, or anything else if not destroyed

(144) Thou hast many examples thereof in this world, that if some creature or man look upon a thing, it perishes because of the poison or venom in the creature: On the other side again, some men, as also beasts and other creatures, can with their tone or words change or alter the malignity or evil of a thing, and bring it into a right form.

(4) And now when he saw and knew by that which God had told him, that he should die and perish, if he did eat of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, it made him continually imagine that he was now no more the Child of God, and that he was not created out of God's own Essence or Substance, out of the first Principle. He conceived that he was now but a mere Child of this World, when he beheld his Corruptibility, and also the monstrous Image which he was in; and that the paradisical that his Spirit and Perfection were driven out of Paradise, (that is, out of the second Principle of God, where the Light or the Heart of God is generated from Eternity to Eternity, and where the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father and the Son;) and that he now lived no more merely by the Word of God, but did eat and drink, viz. the Birth of his Life henceforward consisted, in the third Principle, that is, in the [Region,] Kingdom, or Dominion of the Stars and Elements, and he must now eat of the Virtue and Fruit thereof, and live thereby: And upon this he then supposed, that he was past Recovery, and that the noble Image of God was destroyed. And besides, the Devil also continually represented his Corruptibility and Mortality to him, and himself could see nothing else, seeing he was gone out of Paradise, that is, out of the incorruptible holy i Geniture [or Operation] of God; wherein he was God's holy Image and Child, in which God created him to continue therein for ever. And if the merciful Love of God had not appeared to him again in the Center of the Birth of his Life, and comforted him, he would have thought that he was wholly departed, or quite separated from the eternal divine Birth, and that he was no more in God, nor God any more in him, and that he was no more of God's Essence.

(106) It flattered with the bitter quality, and with the heat, and persuaded them that they should elevate themselves and be kindled, and so together they would destroy their mother, and turn her into a sour form or property, whereby they would domineer with their spirit very sharply over the whole Deity: All must bow down and incline to them; and they would form, frame, figure and image all with their sharpness.

(12) But the reasoning faculty, being peculiar to the human soul, ought not to be impelled similarly with the irrational animals, but ought to discriminate appearances, and not to be carried away by them. The powers, then, of which we have spoken hold out beautiful sights, and honours, and adulteries, and pleasures, and such like alluring phantasies before facile spirits; as those who drive away cattle hold, out branches to them. Then, having beguiled those incapable of distinguishing the true from the false pleasure, and the fading and meretricious from the holy beauty, they lead them into slavery. And each deceit, by pressing constantly on the spirit, impresses its image on it; and the soul unwittingly carries about the image of the passion, which takes its rise from the bait and our consent.

(32) Therefore, O Man! consider what thou hast received with thy bestial Body, to eat and to drink of Evil and Good, which God did forbid. Look here into the Ground of the Essences, and say not with Reason; It was merely for Disobedience, which God was so very angry at, that his Anger could not be quenched. Thou art deceived, for if the clear Deity was angry, it would not have become Man for thy Sake to help thee; look but upon the

(157) Now in all the spirits there was nothing else but a mere hot, fiery, cold and hard corruption, and so one evil quality tasted the others, whereby the whole body grew so very fierce and wrathful; for the heat was against the cold, and the cold against the heat.

(47) And we must further a consider, that when the Shriek [or Crack] makes its Dwelling-house, in its strong Breaking-through, out of the Gate of the anxious Darkness, viz. the Tongue, that the Shriek [or Crack] has not then yet seen the Virgin; but when it reflected [or shined] back again into the Heart, into the opened Darkness, and found her so habitable, there then first sprung up its Joy, and Pleasantness, and it became paradisical, and desired not [to go] into the Tongue again, but into the Head, and [desired] there to have its Region out of the Source of the Heart. Therefore the Tongue ought not in all [or altogether] to be believed, for it sits not in the heavenly Region, as the friendly pleasant Virtue [does;] but it has its Region in the Crack and Flash, and the Flash is as near the hellish Region, as the Crack is, for they are both generated in the Sharpness of the Stars, in the Essences, and the Tongue speaks both Lyes and Truth; in which of the two the Spirit arms itself, according to that it speaks: Also it many Times speaks Lies in great Men; when it is armed from the Essences, then it speaks in the Crack, like a Rider in his [haughty, surly, vaunting State,] or high Mindedness. The Life of the Soul. The Gate.

(61) Now as the Holy Ghost proveth all, so the tongue also proveth all tastes: and if the same pleaseth the spirit, then the spirit bringeth the same into the head, to the other four counsellors before the princely seat, and there it is proved whether it be profitable or wholesome for the qualities of the body.

(107) According to this false or wicked conclusion and result they agreed to do one and the same thing, and so dried up the sweet water in Lucifer's body; the heat kindled it, and the astringent dried it, and then it became very sour and sharp.

(3) "If on the other hand it is a new soul which they have taken out of the sweat of the rulers and out of the tears of their eyes, or far rather out of the breath of their mouths,--in a word, if it is one of the new souls or one of such souls, if it is one out of the sweat, then the five great rulers of the great Fate take up the sweat of all the rulers of their æons, knead it together withal, portion it and make it into a soul. Or far rather if it is refuse of the purification of the Light, then Melchisedec taketh it up from the rulers. The five great rulers of the great Fate knead the refuse together, portion it and make it into different souls, so that every one of the rulers of the æons, every one of them putteth his portion into the soul. For this cause they knead it jointly, so that all may [par]take of the soul. "And the five great rulers, if they portion it and make it into souls, bring it out of the sweat of the rulers. But if it is one out of the refuse of the purification of the Light, then Melchisedec, the great Receiver of the Light, taketh it [ sc. the refuse] up from the rulers, or far rather if it is out of the tears of their eyes or out of the breath of their mouth,--in a word, out of such souls, when the five rulers portion it and make it into different souls,--or far rather if it is an old soul, then the ruler who is in the head of the æons, himself mixeth the cup of forgetfulness with the seed of wickedness, and he mixeth it with every one of the new souls at the time when he is in the region of the head. And that cup of forgetfulness becometh the counterfeiting spirit for that soul, and bideth outside the soul, being a vesture for it and resembling it in every way, being envelope as vesture outside it.

(57) As the tongue breaketh off or divideth the word or syllable, and keeps it half without and half within, so the heart of God would not wholly reject the kindled Salitter, but the malignity, malice and impulse of the devil; and the other part should be reedified or built again after this time.

(42) And they ate before him and he gave them all a portion, but the portion of Benjamin was seven times larger than that of any of theirs.

(4) Speech yields the milk, which is the milk of speech itself to him who knows this Upanishad (secret doctrine) of the Sâmans in this wise. He becomes rich in food, and able to eat food ,--yea, able to eat food.