(13) Now when this is done, then thou art as the whole or total God is, who himself is Heaven, Earth, Stars, and the Elements, and hast also such a Regimen or Dominion in thee, and art also such a Person, as the whole God in the Place of this World is. Now thou sayest: How shall I understand this? For the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of Hell and of the Devil are distinct one from another, and cannot be one Body. Also the Earth and Stones are not God; nor the Heaven, Stars and Elements; much less can a Man be God; for if so, he could not be rejected by God. Here I will tell thee the Ground of all by Degrees, one Thing after another; therefore keep the Question in Mind. Of the astral Birth or Geniture, and of the Birth or Geniture of God.

(13) Thou hast a Similitude of this, in that the Earth and Stones are proceeded out of the Incomprehensibility.

(1) There is above the Celestial Lights an Incorruptible Flame always sparkling; the Spring of Life, the Formation of all Beings, the Original of all things! This Flame produceth all things, and nothing perisheth but what it consumeth. It maketh Itself known by Itself. This Fire cannot be contained in any Place, it is without Body and without Matter. It encompasseth the Heavens. And there goeth out from it little Sparks, which make all the Fires of the Sun, of the Moon, and of the Stars. Behold! what I know of God! Strive not to know more of Him, for that is beyond thy capacity, how wise soever thou art. As to the rest, know that unjust and wicked Man cannot hide himself from the Presence of God ! No subtilty nor excuse can disguise anything from His piercing Eyes. All is full of God, and God is in All!

(75) No; thou child of Man, thou errest, and dost not rightly understand the divine Power: Does not every man in his astral, qualifying or fountain Spirits, comprehend the whole Place or Body of this World, and the Place comprehends Man? it is all but one Body, only there are distinct Members.

(3) But little, i.e. fine, is affirmed respecting Him,--that which leaves behind every mass and distance, and penetrates through all, without hindrance. Yet the little is Elemental Cause of all, for nowhere will you find the idea of the little unparticipated. Thus then the little must be received as regards God as penetrating to all, and through all, without impediment; and operating, and piercing through, to "a dividing of soul and spirit, and joints and marrow"; and "discerning thoughts and intents of heart," yea rather--all things that be. For there is not a creature unmanifest in His sight. This littleness is without quality and without quantity, without restraint, without limit, without bound, comprehending all things, but itself incomprehensible.

(18) Now some of the things said should bear a sense peculiar to themselves. So understand, for instance, what I'm going to say. All are in God, [but] not as lying in a place. For place is both a body and immovable, and things that lie do not have motion. Now things lie one way in the bodiless, another way in being made manifest. Think, [then,] of Him who doth contain them all; and think, that than the bodiless naught is more comprehensive, or swifter, or more potent, but it is the most comprehensive, the swiftest, and most potent of them all.

(69) The Earth has just such Qualities and qualifying or fountain Spirits, as the Deep above the Earth, or as Heaven has, and all of them together belong to one only Body; and the whole or universal God is that one only Body. But that thou doest not wholly and fully see and know him, Sins are the Cause, with, and by which, thou in this great divine Body liest shut up in the dead or mortal Flesh, and the Power or Virtue of the Deity is hidden from thee, even as the Marrow in the Bones is hidden from the Flesh.

(20) Behold what power, what swiftness, thou dost have! And canst thou do all of these things, and God not [do them]? Then, in this way know God; as having all things in Himself as thoughts, the whole Cosmos itself. If, then, thou dost not make thyself like unto God, thou canst not know Him. For like is knowable unto like [alone]. Make, [then,] thyself to grow to the same stature as the Greatness which transcends all measure; leap forth from every body; transcend all time; become Eternity ; and [thus] shalt thou know God. Conceiving nothing is impossible unto thyself, think thyself deathless and able to know all - all arts, all sciences, the way of every life. Become more lofty than all height, and lower than all depth. Collect into thyself all senses of [all] creatures - of fire, [and] water, dry and moist. Think that thou art at the same time in every place - in earth, in sea, in sky; not yet begotten, in the womb, young, old, [and] dead, in after-death conditions. And if thou knowest all these things at once - times, places, doings, qualities, and quantities; thou canst know God.

(6) For neither can he who perceiveth It, perceive aught else; nor he who gazeth on It, gaze on aught else; nor hear aught else, nor stir his body any way. Staying his body's every sense and every motion he stayeth still. And shining then all round his mond, It shines through his whole soul, and draws it out of body, transforming all of him to essence. For it is possible, my son, that a man's soul should be made like to God, e'en while it still is in a body, if it doth contemplate the Beauty of the Good.

(11) If, then, abstracting all that belongs to bodies and things called incorporeal, we cast ourselves into the greatness of Christ, and thence advance into immensity by holiness, we may reach somehow to the conception of the Almighty, knowing not what He is, but what He is not. And form and motion, or standing, or a throne, or place, or right hand or left, are not at all to be conceived as belonging to the Father of the universe, although it is so written.

(80) But if thou sayest, it has but one Kind of Birth or Geniture, thou speakest again also like one that is blind; for the Herbs and Wood, which grow out of it, are not Earth, neither is the Fruit which grows upon a Tree Wood; so also the Power and Virtue of the Fruit is not God neither; but God is in the Center in the innermost Birth in all the three natural Births or Genitures, hiddenly, and is not known, but only in the Spirit of Man; also the outermost Birth in the Fruit does not comprehend, conceive, or contain him, but he contains the outermost Birth of the Fruit, and forms it. Another Question is, [Note, how God is in all Things, yet no Creature is He.] Why then is the Earth so mountainous, hilly, rocky, stony and uneven? Answer.

(4) Behold! thou unapprehensive Man, I will show thee the true Ground of the Deity. If this whole or universal Being be not God, then thou art not God's Image. If he be any other, or strange God, then thou hast no Part in him: For thou art created out of this God, and livest in this very God, and this very God continually gives thee Power or Virtue, and Blessing, also Meat and Drink out of himself; also all thy Knowledge stands in this God, and when thou diest, then thou art buried in this God.

(28) But here you must elevate your Mind in the Spirit, and consider how the whole Nature, with all the Powers which are in Nature, also the Extension, Depth, and Heighth, also Heaven and Earth, and all whatsoever is therein, and all that is above the Heavens, is together the Body or Corporeity of God; and the Powers of the Stars are the Fountain Veins in the natural Body of God, in this World.

(12) First the compacted figured Body is indivisible and incorruptible, and not to be felt by Man's Hands; for it is constituted or composed out of the Divine Power, and that Power is so knit and bound together, that it can never be destroyed again.

(11) It is infinite also by right of being a pure unity with nothing towards which to direct any partial content. Absolutely One, it has never known measure and stands outside of number, and so is under no limit either in regard to any extern or within itself; for any such determination would bring something of the dual into it. And having no constituent parts it accepts no pattern, forms no shape.

Reason recognising it as such a nature, you may not hope to see it with mortal eyes, nor in any way that would be imagined by those who make sense the test of reality and so annul the supremely real. For what passes for the most truly existent is most truly non-existent- the thing of extension least real of all- while this unseen First is the source and principle of Being and sovereign over Reality.

You must turn appearances about or you will be left void of God. You will be like those at the festivals who in their gluttony cram themselves with things which none going to the gods may touch; they hold these goods to be more real than the vision of the God who is to be honoured and they go away having had no share in the sanctities of the shrine.

In these celebrations of which we speak, the unseen god leaves those in doubt of his existence who think nothing patent but what may be known to the flesh: it happens as if a man slept a life through and took the dream world in perfect trust; wake him, and he would refuse belief to the report of his open eyes and settle down to sleep again.

(6) Tat: What then is true, Thrice-greatest One? Hermes: That which is never troubled, son, which cannot be defined; that which no color hath, nor any figure, which is not turned, which hath no garment, which giveth light; that which is comprehensible unto itself [alone], which doth not suffer change; that which no body can contain. Tat: In very truth I lose my reason, father. Just when I thought to be made wise by thee, I find the senses of this mind of mine blocked up. Hermes: Thus is it, son: That which is upward borne like fire, yet is borne down like earth, that which is moist like water, yet blows like air, how shalt thou this perceive with sense - the that which is not solid nor yet moist, which naught can bind or loose, of which in power and energy alone can man have any notion - and even then it wants a man who can perceive the Way of Birth in God?

(53) While he yet sticks in the old Man of Wrath and Death, and fits also in his Heaven, he sees through both; in such a Manner also he sees the Stars and Elements. For in God there is no Place of Hinderance; for the Eye of the LORD beholds all.

(10) He is the God beyond all name; He the unmanifest, He the most manifest; He whom the mind [alone] can contemplate, He visible to the eyes [as well]; He is the one of no body, the one of many bodies, nay, rather He of every body. Naught is there which he is not. For all are He and He is all. And for this cause hath He all names, in that they are one Father's. And for this cause hath He Himself no nome, in that He's Father of [them] all. Who, then, may sing Thee praise of Thee, or [praise] to Thee? Whither, again, am I to turn my eyes to sing Thy praise; above, below, within, without? There is no way, no place [is there] about Thee, nor any other thing of things that are. All [are] in Thee; all [are] from Thee, O Thou who givest all and takest naught, for Thou hast all and naught is there Thou hast not.

(43) When thou beholdest the Deep betwixt the Stars and the Earth, canst thou say, that is not God, or there God is not? O, thou miserable corrupted Man! be instructed; for in the Deep above the Earth, where thou seest and knowest nothing, and sayest there is nothing, yet even there is the high-holy God in his Trinity, and is generating there, as well as in the high Heaven aloft above this World. Or doth thou think, that he departed and went away from his Seat where he did sit from Eternity, in or at the Time of the Creation of this World? O no; that cannot be, for though He could himself do so, He cannot do it, for He himself is All: And as little as a Member of the Body can be rent off from itself, so little can God also be divided, rent, or separated from being every where.