(6) One was of gold, and the other was of silver; First with the white, and after with the yellow, Plied he the door, so that I was content. "Whenever faileth either of these keys So that it turn not rightly in the lock," He said to us, "this entrance doth not open. More precious one is, but the other needs More art and intellect ere it unlock, For it is that which doth the knot unloose. From Peter I have them; and he bade me err Rather in opening than in keeping shut, If people but fall down before my feet." Then pushed the portals of the sacred door, Exclaiming: "Enter; but I give you warning That forth returns whoever looks behind."

(17) Only the Spirit shows thus much, that to them is delivered and intrusted the weighty Talent, and the Key; and they are drowned in the Pleasures of the Flesh, and have buried their weighty Talent in the Earth, and have lost the Key in their proud Drunkenness.

(1) Those, then, that adhere to impious words, and dictate them to others, inasmuch as they do not make a right but a perverse use of the divine words, neither themselves enter into the kingdom of heaven, nor permit those whom they have deluded to attain the truth. But not having the key of entrance, but a false (and as the common phrase expresses it), a counterfeit key (antikleis), by which they do not enter in as we enter in, through the tradition of the Lord, by drawing aside the curtain; but bursting through the side-door, and digging clandestinely through the wall of the Church, and stepping over the truth, they constitute themselves the Mystagogues of the soul of the impious.

(5) The second, tinct of deeper hue than perse, Was of a calcined and uneven stone, Cracked all asunder lengthwise and across. The third, that uppermost rests massively, Porphyry seemed to me, as flaming red As blood that from a vein is spirting forth. Both of his feet was holding upon this The Angel of God, upon the threshold seated, Which seemed to me a stone of diamond. Along the three stairs upward with good will Did my Conductor draw me, saying: "Ask Humbly that he the fastening may undo." Devoutly at the holy feet I cast me, For mercy's sake besought that he would open, But first upon my breast three times I smote. Seven P's upon my forehead he described With the sword's point, and, "Take heed that thou wash These wounds, when thou shalt be within," he said. Ashes, or earth that dry is excavated, Of the same colour were with his attire, And from beneath it he drew forth two keys.

(77) Thou needest not to ask, where that Heaven is. It is in thy Heart, do but open it, the Key is here shown to thee.

(113) It further signifies, that the Holy Ghost in like Manner has an open Gate in the Wrath-house of this World, where he may drive and perform his Work, incomprehensibly as to the Gates of Hell, and where he gathers or collects a holy Seed to his eternal Praise, against, or without the Will of the strong, fast shut hellish Gates, and altogether incomprehensibly as to them.

(31) For without the Illumination thereof you will not understand this Mystery; for there is a strong Lock and Bar before it in the Spirit of Man, that must be first unlocked or opened. And that no Man can do, for the Holy Ghost is the only Key to do it with.

(121) Thou shouldst not suppose, that which I write here to be as a doubtful Opinion, questionable whether it be so or no: For the Gate of Heaven and Hell stands open to the Spirit, and in the Light it presses through them both, and beholds them also; proves or examines them; for the astral Birth or Geniture lives between them both, and must endure to be squeezed.

(112) But that the Lips stand open, when it is come hissing through the Teeth, it signifies, that he with his going forth out of the Heart of God, in the Creation of this World, has opened again the Gates of Heaven, and is gone through the Gates of God's Wrath, and has left the Wrath of God strongly shut and bolted up, and has left the Devil his eternal kindled Wrath-house close locked up, out of which he cannot come eternally.

(34) Surely the Gate will be locked upon thee, and so thou wilt not enter in any more, but wilt dance with the Hellish Wolves in the hellish Fire; truly thou wilt forget then to mock, and Sorrow will gnaw thee. Of the Qualification of an Angel. Question.

(28) Truly it is a narrow and strait Passage, or Entrance, through the Gates of Hell, for them that will press in to God; they must endure many Pangs, Crushings and Squeezings from the Devil.