(120) Therefore no man ought to think that the devil is able to tear the works of the light out of his [man's] heart, for he can neither see nor comprehend them: and though he rageth and raveth in the outermost birth in the flesh, as in his castle of robbery or fort of prey, do not despair; only take heed that thou thyself bring not the works of wrath into the light of thy heart. Then thy soul will be safe enough from the deaf and dumb devil, who is blind in the light

(92) For as the Father generateth the Son out of his power, and as the Son shineth back in the whole Father; so in like manner the power of thy heart, of thy veins, and of thy brain generateth a light which shineth in all thy powers in thy whole body. Open the eyes of thy mind, consider it, and you will find it so.

(9) And ween not, for I call it a darkness or a cloud, that it be any cloud congealed of the humours that flee in the air, nor yet any darkness such as is in thine house on nights when the candle is out. For such a darkness and such a cloud mayest thou imagine with curiosity of wit, for to bear before thine eyes in the lightest day of summer: and also contrariwise in the darkest night of winter, thou mayest imagine a clear shining light. Let be such falsehood. I mean not thus. For when I say darkness, I mean a lacking of knowing: as all that thing that thou knowest not, or else that thou hast forgotten, it is dark to thee; for thou seest it not with thy ghostly eye. And for this reason it is not called a cloud of the air, but a cloud of unknowing, that is betwixt thee and thy God.

(43) And understand by this that he who is in darkness will not be able to see anything unless he receives the light and recovers (his) sight by means of it. Examine yourself (to see) whether you wholly have the light, so that, if you ask about these things, you may understand how you will escape. For many are seeking in darkness, and they grope about, wishing to understand, since there is no light for them.

(16) At first that light came out of the Son of God in the powers of the Father, into the angelical body creaturely, and is the body's proper own, which cannot be withdrawn from it by anything, unless itself extinguished it, as Lucifer did.

(4) "Amēn, I say unto you: For the sake of the race of men, because it is material, I have torn myself asunder and brought unto them all the mysteries of the Light, that I may purify them, for they are the refuse of the whole matter of their matter; else would no soul of the total race of men have been saved, and they would not be able to inherit the kingdom of the Light, if I had not brought unto them the purifying mysteries. "For the emanations of the Light have no need of the mysteries, for they are purified; but it is the race of men which hath need of them, because they all are material refuse For this cause, therefore, have I said unto you aforetime: 'The healthy have no need of the physician, but the sick,'--that is: Those of the Light have no need of the mysteries, for they are purified lights; but it is the race of men which hath need of them, for [they] are material refuse [ pl. ]. "For this cause, therefore, herald to the whole race of men, saying: Cease not to seek day and night, until ye find the purifying mysteries; and say unto the race of men: Renounce the whole world and the whole matter therein. For he who buyeth and selleth in the world and he who eateth and drinketh of its matter and who liveth in all its cares and in all its associations, amasseth other additional matters to the rest of his matter, because this whole world and all therein and all its associations are material refuse [ pl. ], and they will make enquiry of every one concerning his purity. "For this cause, therefore, I have said unto you aforetime: Renounce the whole world and the whole matter therein, that ye may not amass other additional matter to the rest of your matter in you. For this cause, therefore, herald it to the whole race of men, saying: Renounce the whole world and all its associations, that ye may not amass additional matter to the rest of your matter in you; and say unto them: Cease not to seek day and night and remit not yourselves until ye find the purifying mysteries which will purify you and make you into a refined light, so that ye will go on high and inherit the light of my kingdom.

(11) And now it may very exactly be understood by the Essences and Property of the Soul, that in this House of Flesh (where it is as it were generated) it is not at Home; and its horrible Fall may be also understood [thereby.] For it has no Light in itself of its own, it must borrow its Light from the Sun; which indeed springs up along with it in its Birth, but that is corruptible, and the Worm of the Soul is not so; and it is seen that when a Man dies it goes out. And if then the divine Light be not again generated in the Center, then the Soul remains in the eternal Darkness, in the eternal anguishing [Source or] Quality of the Birth, where nothing is to be found in the kindled Captive. Fire, but a horrible Flash of Fire, in which [Source, Property, or] Quality, also the Devils dwell; for it is the first Principle.

(15) 'The sun does not shine there, nor the moon and the stars, nor these lightnings, and much less this fire. When he shines, everything shines after him; by his light all this is lighted.'

(110) Now, that the spirit first conceiveth itself at the heart, and breaketh through all watches and guards till it come upon the tongue, unperceived or unobserved, signifieth that the light brake forth out of the heart of God, through the corrupted, outermost, fierce, dead, bitter and astringent birth or geniture in the nature of this world, incomprehensibly both as to death and the devil, together with the wrath of God; as it is written in the Gospel of St John, [John i. 5.] The light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not.

(2) For as the World’s illumined by the Sun, so is the mind of man illumined by that Light; nay, in [still] fuller measure. For whatsoever thing the Sun doth shine upon, it is anon, by interjection of the Earth or Moon, or by the intervention of the night, robbed of its light. But once the [Higher] Sense hath been commingled with the soul of man, there is at-onement from the happy union of the blending of their natures; so that minds of this kind are never more held fast in errors of the darkness. Wherefore, with reason have they said the [Higher] Senses are the souls of Gods; to which I add: not of all Gods, but of the great ones [only]; nay, even of the principles of these.

(518) Any one who has common sense will remember that the bewilderments of the eyes are of two kinds, and arise from two causes, either from coming out of the light or from going into the light, which is true of the mind’s eye, quite as much as of the bodily eye; and he who remembers this when he sees any one whose vision is perplexed and weak, will not be too ready to laugh; he will first ask whether that soul of man has come out of the brighter life, and is unable to see because unaccustomed to the dark, or having turned from darkness to the day is dazzled by excess of light. And he will count the one happy in his condition and state of being, and he will pity the other; or, if he have a mind to laugh at the soul which comes from below into the light, there will be more reason in this than in the laugh which greets him who returns from above out of the light into the den. That, he said, is a very just distinction. But then, if I am right, certain professors of education must be wrong when they say that they can put a knowledge into the soul which was not there before, like sight into blind eyes. They undoubtedly say this, he replied. Whereas, our argument shows that the power and capacity of learning exists in the soul already; and that just as the eye was unable to turn from darkness to light without the whole body, so too the instrument of knowledge can only by the movement of the whole soul be turned from the world of becoming into that of being, and learn by degrees to endure the sight of being, and of the brightest and best of being, or

(10) The sun does not thine there, nor the moon and the stars, nor these lightnings, and much less this fire. When he shines, everything shines after him; by his light all this is lighted.

(9) "Finally, O Shem, consider yourself pleasing in the thought of the light. Do not let your thought have dealings with the fire and the body of darkness, which was an unclean work. These things that I teach you are right.

(91) From that power springeth up thy light, so that thou seest, understandest and knowest in the same power what thou art to do; for that light glimmereth in thy whole body; and the whole body moveth in the power and knowledge of the light, which signifieth God the Son; for the body helpeth all the members in the knowledge of the light.

(17) Now Man being thus fallen out of the Holy into the Unholy, out of the Image of God into the earthly Corruptibility, therefore his Body stood in the corruptible Death, and his Soul in the eternal Will of the Father, yet turned away from the Heart of God, into the Spirit of this World, captivated by the eternal Darkness; for whatsoever goes out from God, goes into the eternal Darkness, and without the Heart of God there is no Light.

(6) Here is required most inward sense or perception to understand this; for the place where the light is generated in the heart alone comprehendeth it, the outward man does not comprehend it at all.

(15) Now there can be no Meekness without Light, for the Light makes the Meekness, and there can be no Fierceness without the Light, for the Light makes a Longing in the Darkness; and yet there is no Darkness there, but the Longing makes the Darkness in the Will, so that the Will attracts to itself, and impregnates the Longing, so that it becomes thick and dark; for it is thicker than the Will, and therefore it shadows the Will, and is the Darkness of the Will.

(2) Invoking then Jesus, the Paternal Light, the Real, the True, "which lighteth every man coming into the world," "through Whom we have access to the Father," Source of Light, let us aspire, as far as is attainable, to the illuminations handed down by our fathers in the most sacred Oracles, and let us gaze, as we may, upon the Hierarchies of the Heavenly Minds manifested by them symbolically for our instruction. And when we have received, with immaterial and unflinching mental eyes, the gift of Light, primal and super-primal, of the supremely Divine Father, which manifests to us the most blessed Hierarchies of the Angels in types and symbols, let us then, from it, be elevated to its simple splendour. For it never loses its own unique inwardness, but multiplied and going forth, as becomes its goodness, for an elevating and unifying blending of the objects of its care, remains firmly and solitarily centred within itself in its unmoved sameness; and raises, according to their capacity, those who lawfully aspire to it, and makes them one, after the example of its own unifying Oneness. For it is not possible that the supremely Divine Ray should otherwise illuminate us, except so far as it is enveloped, for the purpose of instruction, in variegated sacred veils, and arranged naturally and appropriately, for such as we are, by paternal forethought.

(6) My beloved Reader, just thus is our Mind also. It is the indissoluble Band, which God by the Fiat in the moving Spirit breathed into Adam out of the eternal Mind, [from whence] the Essences are a Particular, or a Sparkle out of the eternal Mind, which has the Center of the Breaking, and in the Breaking has the Sharpness in itself; and that Will drives [forth] the Flash [or Glimpse] in the Breaking, and the Sharpness of the Consuming of the Darkness is in the Glimpse [or Flash] of the Willing, and the Will is our Mind. The Glimpse is the Eyes in the Fire-flash, which discovers itself in our Essences hin us, and without us, for it is free, and has both the Gates open, that [Gate] in the Darkness, and that Gate in the Light. For although it continues in the Darkness, yet it breaks the Darkness, and makes all Light in itself; and where it is, there it sees. As our Thoughts, they can i speculate a Thing that is many Miles off, when the Body is far from thence, and it may be never was in that Place; the Discovery or Glimpse [or piercing Sight of the Eye of the Mind] goes through Wood and Stone, through Bones and Marrow, and there is nothing that can withhold it, for it pierces and breaks the Darkness every where without rending the Body of any Thing, and the Will is its Horse whereon it rides. Here many Things must be concealed, because of the devilish Inchantment, (or else we would reveal much more here,) for the Nigromanticus [Necromancer] is generated here.

(40) Now I have said that there is a False Light; but I must tell you more particularly what it is, and what belongeth thereunto. Behold, all that is contrary to the True Light belongeth unto the False. To the True Light it belongeth of necessity, that it seeketh not to deceive, nor consenteth that any should be wronged or deceived, neither can it be deceived. But the false is deceived and a delusion, and deceiveth others along with itself. For God deceiveth no man, nor willeth that any should be deceived, and so it is with His True Light. Now mark, the True Light is God or divine, but the False Light is Nature or natural. Now it belongeth to God, that He is neither this nor that, neither willeth nor desireth, nor seeketh anything in the man whom He hath made a partaker of the divine nature, save Goodness as Goodness, and for the sake of Goodness. This is the token of the True Light. But to the Creature and Nature it belongeth to be somewhat, this or that, and to intend and seek something, this or that, and not simply what is good without any Wherefore. And as God and the True Light are without all self-will, selfishness, and self-seeking, so do the I, the Me, the Mine, and the like, belong unto the natural and false Light; for in all things it seeketh itself and its own ends, rather than Goodness for the sake of Goodness. This is its property, and the property of nature or the carnal man in each of us. Now mark how it first cometh to be deceived. It doth not desire nor choose Goodness as Goodness, and for the sake of Goodness, but desireth and chooseth itself and its own ends, rather than the Highest Good; and this is an error, and is the first deception. Secondly, it dreameth itself to be that which it is not, for it dreameth itself to be God, and is truly nothing but nature. And because it imagineth itself to be God, it taketh to itself what belongeth to God; and not that which is God’s, when He is made man, or dwelleth in a Godlike man, but that which is God’s, and belongeth unto Him, as He is in eternity, without the creature. For, as it is said, God needeth nothing, is free, not bound to work, apart by Himself, above all things, and so forth (which is all true); and God is unchangeable, not to be moved by anything, and is without conscience, and what He doeth that is well done; “So will I be,” saith the False Light, “for the more like God one is, the better one is, and therefore I will be like God and will be God, and will sit and go and stand at His right hand”: as Lucifer the Evil Spirit also said.45 Now God in Eternity is without contradiction, suffering and grief, and nothing can hurt or vex Him of all that is or befalleth. But with God, when He is made Man, it is otherwise. In a word: all that can be deceived is deceived by this False Light. Now since all is deceived by this False Light that can be deceived, and all that is creature and nature, and all that is not God nor of God, may be deceived, and since this False Light itself is nature, it is possible for it to be deceived. And therefore it becometh and is deceived by itself, in that it riseth and climbeth to such a height that it dreameth itself to be above nature, and fancieth it to be impossible for nature or any creature to get so high, and therefore it cometh to imagine itself God. And hence it taketh unto itself all that belongeth unto God, and specially what is His as He is in Eternity, and not as He is made Man. Therefore it thinketh and declareth itself to be above all works, words, customs, laws and order, and above that life which Christ led in the body which He possessed in His holy human nature.