(18) Ye powers that are within me, hymn the One and All; sing with my Will, Powers all that are within me! O blessed Gnosis, by thee illumined, hymning through thee the Light that mond alone can see, I joy in Joy of Mind. Sing with me praises all ye Powers! Sing praise, my Self-control; sing thou through me, my Righteousness, the praises of the Righteous; sing thou, my Sharing-all, the praises of the All; through me sing, Truth, Truth's praises! Sing thou, O Good, the Good! O Life and Light, from us to you our praises flow! Father, I give Thee thanks, to Thee Thou Energy of all my Powers; I give Thee thanks, O God, Thou Power of all my Energies!

(1) I heard a voice saying to me, "Shem, since you are from an unmixed power and you are the first being upon the earth, hear and understand what I shall say to you first concerning the great powers who were in existence in the beginning before I appeared. There was light and darkness, and there was spirit between them. Since your root fell into forgetfulness—that which was the unconceived spirit—I reveal to you the truth about the powers. The light was thought, full of attentiveness and reason; they were united into one form. And the darkness was wind in waters. He possessed the mind wrapped in chaotic fire. And the spirit between them was a gentle, humble light. These are the three roots. They reigned each in themselves, alone. And they covered each other, each one with its power.

(36) Thereupon are born the divine power of intuition, and the hearing, the touch, the vision, the taste and the power of smell of the spiritual man.

(2) We say, then, that Almighty God is Power, as pre-having, and super-having, every power in Himself, and as Author of every power, and producing everything as beseems a Power inflexible and unencompassed, and as being Author of the very existence of power, either the universal or particular, and as boundless in power, not only by the production of all power, but by being above all, even the self. existent Power, and by His superior power, and by His bringing into existence, ad infinitum, endless powers other than the existing powers; and by the fact that the endless powers, even when brought into existence without end, are not able to blunt the super-endless production of His power-making power; and by the unutterable and unknown, and inconceivable nature of His all-surpassing power, which, through abundance of the powerful, gives power even to weakness, and holds together and preserves the remotest of its echoes; as also we may see even with regard to the powerful insensible perception, that the super-brilliant lights reach even to obscure visions, and they say, that the loud sounds enter even into ears which are not very well adapted to the reception of sounds. For that which does not hear at all is not hearing; and that which does not see at all is not sight.

(12) Possessed of such powers, how does it happen that we do not lay hold of them, but for the most part, let these high activities go idle- some, even, of us never bringing them in any degree to effect?

The answer is that all the Divine Beings are unceasingly about their own act, the Intellectual-Principle and its Prior always self-intent; and so, too, the soul maintains its unfailing movement; for not all that passes in the soul is, by that fact, perceptible; we know just as much as impinges upon the faculty of sense. Any activity not transmitted to the sensitive faculty has not traversed the entire soul: we remain unaware because the human being includes sense-perception; man is not merely a part of the soul but the total.

None the less every being of the order of soul is in continuous activity as long as life holds, continuously executing to itself its characteristic act: knowledge of the act depends upon transmission and perception. If there is to be perception of what is thus present, we must turn the perceptive faculty inward and hold it to attention there. Hoping to hear a desired voice, we let all others pass and are alert for the coming at last of that most welcome of sounds: so here, we must let the hearings of sense go by, save for sheer necessity, and keep the soul's perception bright and quick to the sounds from above.

(4) "And the five great rulers of the great Fate of the æons and the ruler of the disk of the sun and the ruler of the disk of the moon inbreathe within into that soul, and there cometh forth out of them a portion out of my power which the last Helper hath cast into the Mixture. And the portion of that power remaineth within in the soul, unloosed and existing on its own authority for the economy unto which it hath been inset, to give sense unto the soul, in order that it may seek after the works of the Light of the Height always. "And that power is like the species of the soul in every form and resembleth it. It cannot be outside the soul, but remaineth inside it, as I have commanded it from the beginning. When I willed to cast it into the first Commandment, I gave it commandment to remain outside [? inside] the souls for the economy of the First Mystery.

(9) Now the Lord, having come alone into the intellectual world, enters by His sufferings, introduced into the knowledge of the Ineffable, ascending above every name which is known by sound. The lamp, too, was placed to the south of the altar of incense; and by it were shown the motions of the seven planets, that perform their revolutions towards the south. For three branches rose on either side of the tamp, and lights on them; since also the sun, like the lamp, set in the midst of all the planets, dispenses with a kind of divine music the light to those above and to those below.

(12) As one of the old Hermetic writers has truly said: "He who understands the Principle of Vibration, has grasped the scepter of Power."

(5) All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth.

(5) But the gifts of the unfailing Power pass on, both to men and living creatures, and plants, and the entire nature of the universe; and It empowers things united for their mutual friendship and communion, and things divided for their being each within their own sphere and limit, without confusion, and without mingling; and preserves the order and good relations of the whole, for their own proper good, and guards the undying lives of the individual angels inviolate; and the heavenly and the life-giving and astral bodies and orders without change: and makes the period of time possible to be; and disperses the revolutions of time by their progressions, and collects them together by their returns; and makes the powers of fire unquenchable, and the rills of water unfailing; and sets bounds to the aerial current, and establishes the earth upon nothing; and guards its life-giving throes from perishing; and preserves the mutual harmony and mingling of the elements without confusion, and without division; and holds together the bond of soul and body; and arouses the nourishing and growing powers of plants; and sustains the essential powers of the whole; and secures the continuance of the universe without dissolution, and bequeaths the deification Itself, by furnishing a power for this to those who are being deified. And in a word, there is absolutely no single thing which is deprived of the overruling surety and embrace of the Divine Power. For that which absolutely has no power, neither is, nor is anything, nor is there any sort of position of it whatever.

(2) But this power is never drawn down to its participants either in the production of the worlds, or in the providential inspection of the realms of generation, or in predicting concerning it. For it imparts to all things good, and renders all things similar to itself. It likewise benefits the subjects of its government most abundantly, and without envy, and by how much the more it abides in itself, by so much the more it is filled with its own proper perfection. And it does not itself, indeed, become any thing belonging to its participants, but it causes the things which receive it to partake of its peculiarities, and preserves them in an all perfect manner. It also abides at the same time perfectly in itself, and comprehends them at once in itself, but is neither vanquished nor comprehended by any one of them. In vain, therefore, are men disturbed by a suspicion of this kind. For divinity is not divided together with the above mentioned modes of divination, but produces all of them impartibly. Nor does he effect different things at a different time, in a distributed manner, but produces all of them according to one energy, collectively and at once. Nor is he detained about signs, being comprehended in, or divided about, them; but contains them in himself, and in one order, and comprehends them in unity, and produces them from himself, according to one invariable will.

(42) It follows that, for the purposes which have induced this discussion, the stars have no need of memory or of any sense of petitions addressed to them; they give no such voluntary attention to prayers as some have thought: it is sufficient that, in virtue simply of the nature of parts and of parts within a whole, something proceeds from them whether in answer to prayer or without prayer. We have the analogy of many powers- as in some one living organism- which, independently of plan or as the result of applied method, act without any collaboration of the will: one member or function is helped or hurt by another in the mere play of natural forces; and the art of doctor or magic healer will compel some one centre to purvey something of its own power to another centre. just so the All: it purveys spontaneously, but it purveys also under spell; some entity is concerned for a member situated within itself and summons the All which, then, pours in its gift; it gives to its own part by the natural law we have cited since the petitioner is no alien to it. Even though the suppliant be a sinner, the answering need not shock us; sinners draw from the brooks; and the giver does not know of the gift but simply gives- though we must remember that all is one woof and the giving is always consonant with the order of the universe. There is, therefore, no necessity by ineluctable law that one who has helped himself to what lies open to all should receive his deserts then and there.

In sum, we must hold that the All cannot be affected; its leading principle remains for ever immune whatsoever happens to its members; the affection is really present to them, but since nothing existent can be at strife with the total of existence, no such affection conflicts with its impassivity.

Thus the stars, in so far as they are parts, can be affected and yet are immune on various counts; their will, like that of the All, is untouched, just as their bodies and their characteristic natures are beyond all reach of harm; if they give by means of their souls, their souls lose nothing; their bodies remain unchanged or, if there is ebb or inflow, it is of something going unfelt and coming unawares.

(2) "And the voice of the word was heard saying through the majesty of the unconceived spirit, 'Look, the power has been completed. The one who was revealed by me appeared in the spirit.'

(17) Of the same, from the same Hymns of Love. Come then, whilst collecting these again into one, let us say, that it is a certain simplex power, which of itself moves to a sort of unifying combination from the Good, to the lowest of things existing, and from that again in due order, circling round again, through all to the Good from Itself, and through Itself and by Itself, and rolling back to Itself always in the same way.

(7) Thus we give you to understand, that this World (when the Will was moved) was created out of the Darkness, and the Out-going out of the Will in itself is God; and the Out-going out of God is Spirit, which has discovered itself in the dark Will; and that which was discovered were the Essences, and the Vulcanus was the Wheel of the Mind, that divided itself into seven Forms.

(35) But we must give some explanation of these powers. The matter requires a more definite handling. How can there be a difference of power between one triangular configuration and another?

How can there be the exercise of power from man to man; under what law, and within what limits?

The difficulty is that we are unable to attribute causation either to the bodies of the heavenly beings or to their wills: their bodies are excluded because the product transcends the causative power of body, their will because it would be unseemly to suppose divine beings to produce unseemliness.

Let us keep in mind what we have laid down:

The being we are considering is a living unity and, therefore, necessarily self-sympathetic: it is under a law of reason, and therefore the unfolding process of its life must be self-accordant: that life has no haphazard, but knows only harmony and ordinance: all the groupings follow reason: all single beings within it, all the members of this living whole in their choral dance are under a rule of Number.

Holding this in mind we are forced to certain conclusions: in the expressive act of the All are comprised equally the configurations of its members and these members themselves, minor as well as major entering into the configurations. This is the mode of life of the All; and its powers work together to this end under the Nature in which the producing agency within the Reason-Principles has brought them into being. The groupings are themselves in the nature of Reason-Principles since they are the out-spacing of a living-being, its reason-determined rhythms and conditions, and the entities thus spaced-out and grouped to pattern are its various members: then again there are the powers of the living being- distinct these, too- which may be considered as parts of it, always excluding deliberate will which is external to it, not contributory to the nature of the living All.

The will of any organic thing is one; but the distinct powers which go to constitute it are far from being one: yet all the several wills look to the object aimed at by the one will of the whole: for the desire which the one member entertains for another is a desire within the All: a part seeks to acquire something outside itself, but that external is another part of which it feels the need: the anger of a moment of annoyance is directed to something alien, growth draws on something outside, all birth and becoming has to do with the external; but all this external is inevitably something included among fellow members of the system: through these its limbs and members, the All is bringing this activity into being while in itself it seeks- or better, contemplates- The Good. Right will, then, the will which stands above accidental experience, seeks The Good and thus acts to the same end with it. When men serve another, many of their acts are done under order, but the good servant is the one whose purpose is in union with his master's.

In all the efficacy of the sun and other stars upon earthly matters we can but believe that though the heavenly body is intent upon the Supreme yet- to keep to the sun- its warming of terrestrial things, and every service following upon that, all springs from itself, its own act transmitted in virtue of soul, the vastly efficacious soul of Nature. Each of the heavenly bodies, similarly, gives forth a power, involuntary, by its mere radiation: all things become one entity, grouped by this diffusion of power, and so bring about wide changes of condition; thus the very groupings have power since their diversity produces diverse conditions; that the grouped beings themselves have also their efficiency is clear since they produce differently according to the different membership of the groups.

That configuration has power in itself is within our own observation here. Why else do certain groupments, in contradistinction to others, terrify at sight though there has been no previous experience of evil from them? If some men are alarmed by a particular groupment and others by quite a different one, the reason can be only that the configurations themselves have efficacy, each upon a certain type- an efficacy which cannot fail to reach anything naturally disposed to be impressed by it, so that in one groupment things attract observation which in another pass without effect.

If we are told that beauty is the motive of attraction, does not this mean simply that the power of appeal to this or that mind depends upon pattern, configuration? How can we allow power to colour and none to configuration? It is surely untenable that an entity should have existence and yet have no power to effect: existence carries with it either acting or answering to action, some beings having action alone, others both.

At the same time there are powers apart from pattern: and, in things of our realm, there are many powers dependent not upon heat and cold but upon forces due to differing properties, forces which have been shaped to ideal-quality by the action of Reason-Principles and communicate in the power of Nature: thus the natural properties of stones and the efficacy of plants produce many astonishing results.

(20) "From my youth I followed art and science and was tireless in my reading of books. Among those which came to my hand was a volume containing all kinds of invocations and magical formulæ. In this book I discovered information to the effect that a spirit, whether he be of the fire, the water, the earth or the air, can be compelled to do the will of a magician capable of controlling him. I also discovered that according as one spirit has more power than another, each is adapted for a different operation and each is capable of producing certain supernatural effects.

(48) Thence comes the power swift as thought, independent of instruments, and the mastery over matter.

(2) We must rather, therefore, say, that sounds and melodies are appropriately consecrated to the Gods. There is, also, an alliance in these sounds and melodies to the proper orders and powers of the several Gods, to the motions in the universe itself, and to the harmonious sounds which proceed from the motions. Conformably, therefore, to such like adaptations of melodies to the Gods, the Gods themselves become present. For there is not any thing which intercepts; so that whatever has but a casual similitude to, directly participates of, them . A perfect possession, likewise, immediately takes place, and a plenitude of a more excellent essence and power. Not that the body and the soul are in each other, and sympathize, and are copassive with the melodies; but because the inspiration of the Gods is not separated from divine harmony, but is originally adapted and allied to it, on this account it is participated by it in appropriate measures. Hence also, it is excited and restrained according to the several orders of the Gods. But this inspiration must by no means be called an ablation, purgation, or medicine. For it is not primarily implanted in us from a certain disease, or excess, or redundance; but the whole principle and participation of it are supernally derived from the Gods.

(27) Yet you are to know, that the holy Souls are not so void of Ability [or Power;] for their Essences are out of the strong Might of God, out of the first Principle; although (because of their great Humility towards God) they do not use that [Might,] whereas they continually expect their Bodies in that still Rest with great Humility, and yet their Love and Delight is so very great, that at several Times they have wrought great Wonders [or Miracles,] among the Faithful upon Earth; which [faithful People] so vigorously set their Love and Desire in them, that one holy Tincture took hold of the other, and so through the Faith of the Living, Wonders are thus done, for there is nothing impossible to Faith.