(138) For the Goddess bringeth forth the Vast Sun, and the lucent Moon.

(1) It came to pass then, when that light-power had come down over Jesus, that it gradually surrounded him entirely. Then Jesus ascended or soared into the height, shining most exceedingly in an immeasurable light. And the disciples gazed after him and none of them spake, until he had reached unto heaven; but they all kept in deep silence. This then came to pass on the fifteenth day of the moon, on the day on which it is full in the month Tybi.

(1) Oh thou who shinest forth from the Moon, thou who givest light from the Moon, let me come forth at large amid thy train, let me be revealed as one of those in glory. Let the Tuat be opened for me. Here am I: let me come forth upon this day, and be glorified. Let the glorified ones grant to me that I live and that mine adversaries be brought to me in bonds before the divine Circle; may the Genius of my mother be propitiated thereby, as I rise up upon my feet with a sceptre of gold in my hand, and lop off the limbs. May I rise up, a Babe [from between] the knees of Sothis, when they close together together

(2) And it came to pass then, on the fifteenth day of the moon in the month Tybi, which is the day on which the moon is full, on that day then, when the sun had come forth in his going, that there came forth behind him a great light-power shining most exceedingly, and there was no measure to the light conjoined with it. For it came out of the Light of lights, and it came out of the last mystery, which is the four-and-twentieth mystery, from within without,--those which are in the orders of the second space of the First Mystery. And that light-power came down over Jesus and surrounded him entirely, while he was seated removed from his disciples, and he had shone most exceedingly, and there was no measure for the light which was on him.

(16) Thou completest the hours of the Night, according as thou hast measured them out. And when thou hast completed them according to thy rule, day dawneth

(1) Jesus answered and said unto Mary: "A day of the Light is a thousand years in the world, so that thirty-six-myriads of years and a half-myriad of years of the world are a single year of the Light. "I shall, therefore, pass a thousand years of the Light being king in the midst of the last Helper, and being king over all the emanations of the Light and over the whole number of the perfect souls who have received the mysteries of the Light.

(4) But when the sun has set, Yajnavalkya, what light does a person here have? ' 'The moon, indeed, is his light/ said he, c for with the moon, indeed, as his light one sits, moves around, does his work, and returns/ ' Quite so, Yajnavalkya.

(17) Sun and Moon - one* the day, the other the night, bow to the dust in adoration; and from their worship comes their movement. It is God who has spread out the day in whiteness, it is he who has folded up the night and blackened it.

(4) But when the sun has set, and the moon has set, what light does a person here have? ' ' Fire, indeed, is his light/ said he, c for with fire, indeed, as his light one sits, moves around, does his work, and returns/ ' Quite so, Yajnavalkya.

(2) As when in nights serene of the full moon Smiles Trivia among the nymphs eternal Who paint the firmament through all its gulfs, Saw I, above the myriads of lamps, A Sun that one and all of them enkindled, E'en as our own doth the supernal sights, And through the living light transparent shone The lucent substance so intensely clear Into my sight, that I sustained it not. O Beatrice, thou gentle guide and dear! To me she said: "What overmasters thee A virtue is from which naught shields itself. There are the wisdom and the omnipotence That oped the thoroughfares 'twixt heaven and earth, For which there erst had been so long a yearning." As fire from out a cloud unlocks itself, Dilating so it finds not room therein, And down, against its nature, falls to earth, So did my mind, among those aliments Becoming larger, issue from itself, And that which it became cannot remember. "Open thine eyes, and look at what I am: Thou hast beheld such things, that strong enough Hast thou become to tolerate my smile."

(4) More of the mount by us was now encompassed, And far more spent the circuit of the sun, Than had the mind preoccupied imagined, When he, who ever watchful in advance Was going on, began: "Lift up thy head, 'Tis no more time to go thus meditating. Lo there an Angel who is making haste To come towards us; lo, returning is From service of the day the sixth handmaiden. With reverence thine acts and looks adorn, So that he may delight to speed us upward; Think that this day will never dawn again." I was familiar with his admonition Ever to lose no time; so on this theme He could not unto me speak covertly. Towards us came the being beautiful Vested in white, and in his countenance Such as appears the tremulous morning star. His arms he opened, and opened then his wings; "Come," said he, "near at hand here are the steps, And easy from henceforth is the ascent." At this announcement few are they who come! O human creatures, born to soar aloft, Why fall ye thus before a little wind?

(30) And in periods of seven days the moon undergoes its changes. In the first week she becomes half moon; in the second, full moon; and in the third, in her wane, again half moon; and in the fourth she disappears. Further, as Seleucus the mathematician lays down, she has seven phases. First, from being invisible she becomes crescent-shaped, then half moon, then gibbous and full; and in her wane again gibbous, and in like manner half moon and crescent-shaped.

(2) For as the sun the sight that trembles most, Even so the memory of that sweet smile My mind depriveth of its very self. From the first day that I beheld her face In this life, to the moment of this look, The sequence of my song has ne'er been severed; But now perforce this sequence must desist From following her beauty with my verse, As every artist at his uttermost. Such as I leave her to a greater fame Than any of my trumpet, which is bringing Its arduous matter to a final close, With voice and gesture of a perfect leader She recommenced: "We from the greatest body Have issued to the heaven that is pure light; Light intellectual replete with love, Love of true good replete with ecstasy, Ecstasy that transcendeth every sweetness. Here shalt thou see the one host and the other Of Paradise, and one in the same aspects Which at the final judgment thou shalt see." Even as a sudden lightning that disperses The visual spirits, so that it deprives The eye of impress from the strongest objects,

(23) Adoration to thee, who arisest out of the Golden, and givest light to the earth on the day of thy birth. Thy mother bringeth thee forth upon her hands, that thou mayest give light to the whole circumference which the Solar Orb enlighteneth

(1) When he who all the world illuminates Out of our hemisphere so far descends That on all sides the daylight is consumed, The heaven, that erst by him alone was kindled, Doth suddenly reveal itself again By many lights, wherein is one resplendent. And came into my mind this act of heaven, When the ensign of the world and of its leaders Had silent in the blessed beak become; Because those living luminaries all, By far more luminous, did songs begin Lapsing and falling from my memory. O gentle Love, that with a smile dost cloak thee, How ardent in those sparks didst thou appear, That had the breath alone of holy thoughts! After the precious and pellucid crystals, With which begemmed the sixth light I beheld, Silence imposed on the angelic bells, I seemed to hear the murmuring of a river That clear descendeth down from rock to rock, Showing the affluence of its mountain-top. And as the sound upon the cithern's neck Taketh its form, and as upon the vent Of rustic pipe the wind that enters it,

(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.

(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.

(12) The Moon-god he caused to shine forth, the night he entrusted to him

(7) Behold, again, the seven subject Worlds; ordered by Aeon's order, and with their varied course full-filling Aeon! [See how] all things [are] full of light, and nowhere [is there] fire; for 'tis the love and the blending of the contraries and the dissimilars that doth give birth to light down shining by the energy of God, the Father of all good, the Leader of all order, and Ruler of the seven world-orderings! [Behold] the Moon, forerunner of them all, the instrument of nature, and the transmuter of its lower matter! [Look at] the Earth set in the midst of All, foundation of the Cosmos Beautiful, feeder and nurse of things on Earth! And contemplate the multitude of deathless lives, how great it is, and that of lives subject to death; and midway, between both, immortal [lives] and mortal, [see thou] the circling Moon.

(2) This moon is honey for all things, and all things are honey for this moon. This shining, immortal Person who is in this moon, and, with reference to oneself, this shining, immortal Person consisting of mind— he is just this Soul, this Immortal, this Brahma, this All.