(366) It is better for you to be silent about the word of God, than to speak recklessly.

(1) Yea, I will speak forth; hear ye; now listen, ye who from near, and ye who from afar have come seeking (the knowledge). Now ponder ye clearly all (that concerns) him . Not for a second time shall the false teacher slay our life (of the mind, or the body). The wicked is hemmed in with his faith and his tongue!

(99) Woe to you who set at nought the words of the righteous; for ye shall have no hope of life.

(3) His cheer and his words should be full of ghostly wisdom, full of fire, and of fruit spoken in sober soothfastness without any falsehood, far from any feigning or piping of hypocrites. For some there be that with all their might, inner and outer, imagineth in their speaking how they may stuff them and underprop them on each side from falling, with many meek piping words and gestures of devotion: more looking after for to seem holy in sight of men, than for to be so in the sight of God and His angels. For why, these folk will more weigh, and more sorrow make for an unordained gesture or unseemly or unfitting word spoken before men, than they will for a thousand vain thoughts and stinking stirrings of sin wilfully drawn upon them, or recklessly used in the sight of God and the saints and the angels in heaven. Ah, Lord God! where there be any pride within, there such meek piping words be so plenteous without. I grant well, that it is fitting and seemly to them that be meek within, for to shew meek and seemly words and gestures without, according to that meekness that is within in the heart. But I say not that they shall then be shewed in broken nor in piping voices, against the plain disposition of their nature that speak them. For why, if they be true, then be they spoken in soothfastness, and in wholeness of voice and of their spirit that speak them. And if he that hath a plain and an open boisterous voice by nature speak them poorly and pipingly—I mean but if he be sick in his body, or else that it be betwixt him and his God or his confessor—then it is a very token of hypocrisy. I mean either young hypocrisy or old.

(1) But this can only be averred of a few men endowed with pious minds. Still, of the rest, the vicious folk, we ought to say no word, for fear a very sacred sermon should be spoiled by thinking of them.

(22) sufficient ingenuity for imposition. Such men are mingled by the Enemy of human welfare among those who seek to do good, thus making Truth more difficult of discovery. Believe us, Truth is simple and unconcealed, while falsehood is complex, deeply hidden, proud, and its fictitious worldly knowledge, seemingly a glitter with godly luster, is often mistaken for divine wisdom. You that are wise will turn from these false teachings and come to us, who seek not your money but freely offer you our greater treasure. We desire not your goods, but that you should become partakers of our goods. We do not deride parables, but invite you to understand all parables and all secrets. We do not ask you to receive us, but invite you to come unto our kingly houses and palaces, not because of ourselves but because we are so ordered by the Spirit of God, the desire of our most excellent Father C.R.C., and the need of the present moment, which is very great.

(1) COURTEOUS Reader, here I would have you faithfully admonished to let go your opinion and conceit, and not yield to the spell of the Heathenish wisdom, nor be offended at the simplicity of the author: for this work comes not from his reason, but from the impulse of the spirit.

(99) Woe to you who write down lying and godless words; for they write down their lies that men may hear them and act godlessly towards (their) neighbour.

(94) I do not write this, and bring it to light, that others after me should presently fall a writing, and publish the conceits of their own spirit herein, and cry them up for sanctity, or for a holy thing.

(5) And now come I to thee; and these things I speak in the world, that they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves. I have given them thy word; and the world hath hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth. As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world. And for their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified through the truth.

(2) "Say unto them: Renounce the whole world and the whole matter therein and all its care and all its sins, in a word all its associations which are in it, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from all the chastisements which are in the judgments. "Say unto them: Renounce murmuring, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the fire of the dog-faced [one]. "Say unto them: Renounce eavesdropping [?], that ye may [be worthy of the mysteries of the Light] and be saved from the judgments of the dog-faced [one]. "Say unto them: Renounce litigiousness [?], that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the chastisements of Ariēl. "Say unto them: Renounce false slander, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the [paragraph continues] Light and be saved from the fire-rivers of the dog-faced [one]. "Say unto them: Renounce false witness, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and that ye may escape and be saved from the fire-rivers of the dog-faced [one]. "Say unto them: Renounce pride and haughtiness, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the fire-pits of Ariēl. "Say unto them: Renounce belly-love, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the judgments of Amente. "Say unto them: Renounce babbling, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the fires of Amente. "Say unto them: Renounce craftiness, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the chastisements which are in Amente. "Say unto them: Renounce avarice, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the fire-rivers of the dog-faced [one]. "Say unto them: Renounce love of the world, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the pitch- and fire-coats of the dog-faced [one]. "Say unto them: Renounce pillage, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the fire-rivers of Ariēl. "Say unto them: Renounce evil conversation, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the chastisements of the fire-rivers . . . . "Say unto them: Renounce wickedness, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the fire-seas of Ariēl. "Say unto them: Renounce pitilessness, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the judgments of the dragon-faced [ones]. "Say unto them: Renounce wrath, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the fire-rivers of the dragon-faced [ones.] "Say unto them: Renounce cursing, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the fire-seas of the dragon-faced [ones]. "Say unto them: Renounce thieving, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the bubbling seas of the dragon-faced [ones]. "Say unto them: Renounce robbery, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from Yaldabaōth. "Say unto them: Renounce slandering, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the fire-rivers of the lion-faced [one]. "Say unto them: Renounce fighting and strife, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the seething rivers of Yaldabaōth. "Say unto them: Renounce all unknowing, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the servitors of Yaldabaōth and the fire-seas. "Say unto them: Renounce evil doing, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from all the demons of Yaldabaōth and all his judgments. "Say unto them: Renounce sloth, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the seething pitch-seas of Yaldabaōth. "Say unto them: Renounce adultery, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light-kingdom and be saved from the sulphur- and pitch-seas of the lion-faced [one]. "Say unto them: Renounce murder, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the crocodile-faced ruler,--this one who is in the cold, is the first chamber of the outer darkness. "Say unto them: Renounce pitilessness and impiety, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the rulers of the outer darkness. "Say unto them: Renounce atheism, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the howling and grinding of teeth. "Say unto them: Renounce [magic] potions, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the great cold and the hail of the outer darkness. "Say unto them: Renounce blasphemy, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from the great dragon of the outer darkness. "Say unto them: Renounce the doctrines of error, that ye may be worthy of the mysteries of the Light and be saved from all the chastisements of the great dragon of the outer darkness. "Say unto those who teach the doctrines of error and to every one who is instructed by them: Woe unto you, for, if ye do not repent and abandon your error, ye will go into the chastisements of the great dragon and of the outer darkness, which is exceedingly evil, and never will ye be cast [up] into the world, but will be non-existent until the end. "Say unto those who abandon the doctrines of truth of the First Mystery: Woe unto you, for your chastisement is sad compared with [that of] all men. For ye will abide in the great cold and ice and hail in the midst of the dragon and of the outer darkness, and ye will never from this hour on be cast [up] into the world, but ye shall be frozen up [?] in that region and at the dissolution of the universe ye will perish and become non-existent eternally.

(9) Hearken unto me every one of you. Hear, and understand. Not that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man. There is nothing from without a man, that entering into him can defile him; but the things which come out of him, those are they that defile the man.

(30) Wilt thou be an Apostle of Christ, and wilt be but a Minister for the Belly, and teach only according to thy Art? From whom dost thou teach? From thy Belly, that thou mayest fatten thyself thereby. It is true, thou shouldst be fed, and thou should have Subsistence from Men, if thou art Christ's Disciple; but thy Spirit should not stick in Covetousness, but in Christ; thou shouldst not rely only upon thy Art, but shouldst give up thyself to God, that God may speak from thee, and then thou art in the Temple of God, and not in the Temple of the Institution of Man's Inventions.

(3) ¶Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you.

(6) And if you do these things, O my son, you will be victorious over all your enemies, and they will not be able to wage war against you, neither will they be able to resist, nor will they be able to get in your way. For if you find these, you will despise them as deniers of truth. They will speak to you, cajoling you and enticing (you), not because they are afraid of you, but because they are afraid of those who dwell within you, namely, the guardians of the divinity and the teaching.

(15) "What is right is for you to sing praise to god so it may be written in this imperishable book."

(105) Be not godless in your hearts, and lie not and alter not the words of uprightness, nor charge with lying the words of the Holy Great One, nor take account of your idols; for all your lying and all your godlessness issue not in righteousness but in great sin.

(85) And be not as the merchants of the Word of God.

(4) And this is what the Son of Man reveals to us: It is fitting for you (pl.) to receive the word of truth, if one will receive it perfectly. But as for one who is in ignorance, it is difficult for him to diminish his works of darkness which he has done. Those who have known Imperishability, however, have been able to struggle against passions [...]. I have said to you, "Do not build nor gather for yourselves in the place where the brigands break open, but bring forth fruit to the Father."

(147) I do not write this for my own praise, but to that end that the Reader may know wherein my knowledge stands, that he might not seek that from me which I have not, or think me to be what I am not.