(8) Yet this first Will in the Mind ought not to stay behind in the Abyss of the sour Fierceness, (in which the fierce Malice is,) but ought to go forward in the Center of the Breaking forth out of the Darkness into the Light, for in the Light there is mere Meekness, Lowliness, Humility, Good- Will, and friendly Desires, that it might with its re-conceived Will go out of itself, and to Or earnest Will. open itself in its precious Treasury. For in the re-conceived Will to the Birth of the Light, there is no Source of Anxiety, but only mere friendly Desires; for the Glimpse rises up out of the Darkness in itself, and desires the Light; and the Desiring draws the Light into itself, and there the Anguish becomes an exulting Joy in itself, an humble Chearfulness, a pleasant Habitation. For the re-conceived Will in the Light is impregnated, and its Fruit in the Body is Virtue [or Power,] which the Will desires to generate, and to live therein; and this Desiring brings the Fruit out of the impregnated Will, [and presents it] before the Will, and the Will discovers itself [glimmers or shines] in the Fruit in an infinite pleasant Number; and there goes forth, in the pleasant Number, in the discovered [or manifested] Will, the high Benediction [or Blessing,] Favour, loving Kindness, pleasant Inclination [or yielding Pliableness,] the Taste of Joy, the Well-doing of Meekness [or Affability,] and [further] what my Pen cannot express. The Mind would much rather be freed from Vanity, and live therein without Molestation or Disturbance.

(51) And in this Joy, in the Water-Spring, [or Source,] the pleasant Source of the bottomless Love rises up, and all that rises up there is the second Principle: For the whole Begetting or Generating falls into a glorious Love; for the Harshness now loves the Light dearly, because it is so refreshing, chearly, and beautiful; for from this pleasant Refreshing it becomes thus sweet, courteous, and humble [or lowly;] and the Bitterness now loves the Harshness, because it is no more dark, nor so strongly [eagerly or fiercely] attractive to itself, but is sweet, mild, pure, and light.

(30) But the Sweetness is like Oil or Fire, wherein the Flash continually kindles itself, so that it shines: But the Oil being sweet, and mingled with the Matrix of the Water, therefore the shining Light is steady, [constant and fixed,] and sweet: But seeing it cannot, in the Nature of the Water, continue to be an Oil only (because of the Infection of the Water) therefore it becomes thick; and the [Nature or] Kind of the Fire colours it red; and this is the Blood and the Tincture in a Creature, wherein the noble Life stands. Of the Death and of the Dying. The Gate of Affliction and of Misery.

(3) And now when we consider our Mind, in the Light of Nature, and what that is, which makes us zealous [or earnest,] which burns there [in] as a Light, and is desirous [thirsty or covetous] like Fire, which desires to receive from that Place where it has not sown, and would reap in that Country where the Body is not at Home [or dwells not,] then the precious Virgin of the Wisdom of God meets us, in the middlemost Seat in the Center of the Light of Life, and says; The Light is mine, and the [Power or] Virtue and Glory is mine, also the Gate of Knowledge is mine, I live in the Light of Nature, and without me you can neither see, know, nor understand any Thing of my Virtue, [or Power.] I am thy Bridegroom in the Light; and thy Desire [or Longing] after my Virtue [or Power] is my Attracting in myself; I sit in my Throne, but thou knowest me not; I am in thee, and thy Body is not in me. I distinguish [or separate,] and thou seest it not. I am the Light of the Senses, and the Root of the Senses is not in me, but near me. I am the Bridegroom of the Root, but she has put on a rough Coat. I [will] not lay myself in her Arms till she puts that off, and then I will rest eternally in her Arms, and adorn the Root with my Virtue [and Power,] and give her my beautiful Form, and will espouse myself to her with my Pearl.

(14) And then we find also, how the Meekness is the Virtue and the Spirit, so that where the Meekness is not, there the Fierceness (in itself) is nothing but a Darkness and a Death, where no i Growing can spring up, and it cannot generate nor discover its Wonders; and thus we find that the Fierceness [Wrath or Sourness] is a Cause of the Essences, and [that] the Meekness [is] a Cause of the Joy, and a Cause of the Rising and [Budding] or Growing forth of the Essences; and then that the Spirit is generated by the Flowing, [Working, Springing,] and Rising up, out of the Essences, and that the Fierceness so becomes the Root of the Spirit, and the Meekness is its Life.

(20) So now a Spirit is nothing else but a Springing Will, and in the Will there is the Anguish to the Birth, and in the Anguish the Fire generates itself, and in the Fire the Light, and from the Light the Will becomes friendly, pleasant, mild, and sweet, and in the sweet Will the Kingdom and the Glory generates itself. Thus the Light keeps the Might [or Power;] and if that be put out, then the Virtue [or Power] and Glory ceases, and the Kingdom also.

(13) For observe it, although now in the Harshness there be Bitterness, Fire, Sound, Water, and that out of the springing Vein of the Water there flows Love (or Oil) from whence the Light arises and shines; yet the Harshness retains its first Property, and the Bitterness its Property, the Fire its Property, the Sound or the Stirring its Property, and the overcoming the first harsh or tart Anguish, (viz. the returning down back again) or the Water-Spirit, its Property, and the springing Fountain, the pleasant Love, which is kindled by the Light in the tart or sour Bitterness, (which now is the sweet [Source or] springing Vein of Water,) its property; and yet this is no separable Essence parted asunder, but all one whole Essence or Substance in one another. And each Form or Birth takes its own Form, Virtue, Working and Springing up from all the Forms; and the whole Birth now retains chiefly but these four Forms in its generating or bringing forth; viz. the rising up, the falling down, and then through the turning [of the Wheel in the sour, harsh,] tart Essence, the putting forth on this Side, and on that Side, on both Sides like a Cross; or, as I may so say, the going forth from the Point [or Center] towards the East, the West, the North and the South: For from the Stirring, Moving, and Ascending of the Bitterness in the Fire-Flash, there exists a cross Birth. For the Fire goes forth upward, the Water downward, and the Essences of the Harshness sideways.

(18) But the soul - she who has tasted these things - realized that sweet passions are transitory. She had learned about evil; she went away from them and she entered into a new conduct. Afterwards she despises this life, because it is transitory. And she looks for those foods that will take her into life, and leaves behind her those deceitful foods. And she learns about her light, as she goes about stripping off this world, while her true garment clothes her within, (and) her bridal clothing is placed upon her in beauty of mind, not in pride of flesh. And she learns about her depth and runs into her fold, while her shepherd stands at the door. In return for all the shame and scorn, then, that she received in this world, she receives ten thousand times the grace and glory.

(11) Behold now, when the Bitterness, or the bitter Sting [or Prickle,] (which in the Original was so very bitter, raging and tearing, when it took its Original in the Harshness,) attains this clear Light, and tastes now the Sweetness in the Harshness, which is its Mother, then it is so joyful, and cannot rise or swell so any more, but it trembles and rejoices in its Mother that bare it, and triumphs like a joyful Wheel in the Birth. And in this Triumph the Birth attains the fifth Form, and then the fifth Source springs up, viz. the friendly Love; and so when the bitter Spirit tastes the sweet Water, it rejoices in its Mother [the sour tart Harshness,] and so refreshes and strengthens itself therein, and makes its Mother stirring zin great Joy; where then there springs up the sweet Water-Spirit a very sweet pleasant Source or Fountain: For the Fire-Spirit (which is the Root of the Light, which was a strong [fierce rumbling Shriek, Crack, or] Terror in the Beginning) that now rises up very lovely, pleasantly and joyfully. The divine everlasting Gates or Doors, by which we have Entrance to the Deity,

(31) But if it puts its Will forward into Meekness (viz. into the Obedience of God) then it is in the Source [or of the Quality and Property] of the Heart of God, and receives divine Virtue, and then all its rough Essences become angelical and joyful; and then its rough Essences are very serviceable to it, and are better and more profitable to it, than that it were altogether sweet in the Originality; in which [being sweet] there would be no Strength, nor such mighty Power as in the harsh, bitter, and fiery [Essences.]

(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.

(4) But there are earlier and loftier beauties than these. In the sense-bound life we are no longer granted to know them, but the soul, taking no help from the organs, sees and proclaims them. To the vision of these we must mount, leaving sense to its own low place.

As it is not for those to speak of the graceful forms of the material world who have never seen them or known their grace- men born blind, let us suppose- in the same way those must be silent upon the beauty of noble conduct and of learning and all that order who have never cared for such things, nor may those tell of the splendour of virtue who have never known the face of Justice and of Moral-Wisdom beautiful beyond the beauty of Evening and of dawn.

Such vision is for those only who see with the Soul's sight- and at the vision, they will rejoice, and awe will fall upon them and a trouble deeper than all the rest could ever stir, for now they are moving in the realm of Truth.

This is the spirit that Beauty must ever induce, wonderment and a delicious trouble, longing and love and a trembling that is all delight. For the unseen all this may be felt as for the seen; and this the Souls feel for it, every soul in some degree, but those the more deeply that are the more truly apt to this higher love- just as all take delight in the beauty of the body but all are not stung as sharply, and those only that feel the keener wound are known as Lovers.

(11) Now the Sourness (in its Lust or great Longing [or Panting] after the Light) attracts continually, and in its own Substance it is nothing else but a vehement Hunger, very dry, and as [a Vacuum or] nothing at all, a desiring Will, as the Darkness after the Light; and its Hunger, or Attracting, makes the Bitterness, the Woe [or Lamentation] that it cannot be satiated, or mollified, from whence the Anguish rises, so that the Will, or Prickle, [or Sting] is rubbed, [or struck] in itself, from the Lust of the Desiring, and it will not yield itself to the dark Nothing, or dead Will, but sets its Desire and Anguish, and also its [eager or] strong Will so very hard towards the hidden Light of God, that thereby the Will becomes a twinkling Flash, like a sparkling or crackling Fire, whereby the Sourness, that is so very aching, is continually filled, and as it were deadened, whereby the sour Spirit comes to be soft, sweet, and material, even Water.

(17) The Propagation of the Love is most especially to be observed, for it is the loveliest, pleasantest, and sweetest Fountain of all. When the Love generates again a whole Birth, with all the Fountains of the original Essences out of itself, so that the Love in all the a springing Veins in that new Birth is predominant and chief, so that a Center arises therein, then the first Essence, vis. the Tartness, is wholly desirous or longing, wholly sweet, wholly light, and gives itself forth to be Food to all the Qualities, with a hearty Affection towards them all, as a loving Mother has towards her Children, and here the Bitterness may be rightly called Joy, for it is the Rising or Moving [thereof.] What Joy there is here, there is no other Similitude of it, than when a Man is suddenly and unexpectedly delivered out of the Pain and Torment of Hell, and put into the Light of the Divine Joy.

(5) But we have spoken of these things in our Symbolical Theology. Let us now then celebrate the spiritual Name of Light, under Which we contemplate the Good, and declare that He, the Good, is called spiritual Light, on the ground that He fills every supercelestial mind with spiritual light, and expels all ignorance and error from all souls in which they may be, and imparts to them all sacred light, and cleanses their mental vision from the mist which envelops them, from ignorance, and stirs up and unfolds those enclosed by the great weight of darkness, and imparts, at first, a measured radiance; then, whilst they taste, as it were, the light, and desire it more, more fully gives Itself, and more abundantly enlightens them, because "they have loved much," and ever elevates them to things in advance, as befits the analogy of each for aspiration.

(7) And sweet to us is such a deprivation, Because our good in this good is made perfect, That whatsoe'er God wills, we also will." After this manner by that shape divine, To make clear in me my short-sightedness, Was given to me a pleasant medicine; And as good singer a good lutanist Accompanies with vibrations of the chords, Whereby more pleasantness the song acquires, So, while it spake, do I remember me That I beheld both of those blessed lights, Even as the winking of the eyes concords, Moving unto the words their little flames.

(46) Now the Will or the Desiring in the Dryness cannot reach the Light; and therein consists the Anguish in the Will [Longing] after the Light; and the Anguish is attractive, and in the Attracting is the Woe, and the Woe makes the Anguish greater, so that the Anguish in the Harshness attracts much more, and this Attracting in the Woe is the bitter [Sting or] Prickle, or the Bitterness of the Woe; and the Anguish reaches after the [Sting or] Prickle with attracting, and yet cannot comprehend it, because it resists, and the more the Anguish attracts, the more the [Sting or] Prickle raves and rages.

(31) But since Thence come the beauty and light in all, it is Thence that Intellectual-Principle took the brilliance of the Intellectual Energy which flashed Nature into being; Thence soul took power towards life, in virtue of that fuller life streaming into it. Intellectual-Principle was raised thus to that Supreme and remains with it, happy in that presence. Soul too, that soul which as possessing knowledge and vision was capable, clung to what it saw; and as its vision so its rapture; it saw and was stricken; but having in itself something of that principle it felt its kinship and was moved to longing like those stirred by the image of the beloved to desire of the veritable presence. Lovers here mould themselves to the beloved; they seek to increase their attraction of person and their likeness of mind; they are unwilling to fall short in moral quality or in other graces lest they be distasteful to those possessing such merit- and only among such can true love be. In the same way the soul loves the Supreme Good, from its very beginnings stirred by it to love. The soul which has never strayed from this love waits for no reminding from the beauty of our world: holding that love- perhaps unawares- it is ever in quest, and, in its longing to be borne Thither, passes over what is lovely here and with one glance at the beauty of the universe dismisses all; for it sees that all is put together of flesh and Matter, befouled by its housing, made fragmentary by corporal extension, not the Authentic Beauty which could never venture into the mud of body to be soiled, annulled.

By only noting the flux of things it knows at once that from elsewhere comes the beauty that floats upon them and so it is urged Thither, passionate in pursuit of what it loves: never- unless someone robs it of that love- never giving up till it attain.

There indeed all it saw was beautiful and veritable; it grew in strength by being thus filled with the life of the True; itself becoming veritable Being and attaining veritable knowledge, it enters by that neighbouring into conscious possession of what it has long been seeking.

(22) That light known, then indeed we are stirred towards those Beings in longing and rejoicing over the radiance about them, just as earthly love is not for the material form but for the Beauty manifested upon it. Every one of those Beings exists for itself but becomes an object of desire by the colour cast upon it from The Good, source of those graces and of the love they evoke. The soul taking that outflow from the divine is stirred; seized with a Bacchic passion, goaded by these goads, it becomes Love. Before that, even Intellectual-Principle with all its loveliness did not stir the soul; for that beauty is dead until it take the light of The Good, and the soul lies supine, cold to all, unquickened even to Intellectual-Principle there before it. But when there enters into it a glow from the divine, it gathers strength, awakens, spreads true wings, and however urged by its nearer environing, speeds its buoyant way elsewhere, to something greater to its memory: so long as there exists anything loftier than the near, its very nature bears it upwards, lifted by the giver of that love. Beyond Intellectual-Principle it passes but beyond The Good it cannot, for nothing stands above That. Let it remain in Intellectual-Principle and it sees the lovely and august, but it is not there possessed of all it sought; the face it sees is beautiful no doubt but not of power to hold its gaze because lacking in the radiant grace which is the bloom upon beauty.

Even here we have to recognise that beauty is that which irradiates symmetry rather than symmetry itself and is that which truly calls out our love.

Why else is there more of the glory of beauty upon the living and only some faint trace of it upon the dead, though the face yet retains all its fulness and symmetry? Why are the most living portraits the most beautiful, even though the others happen to be more symmetric? Why is the living ugly more attractive than the sculptured handsome? It is that the one is more nearly what we are looking for, and this because there is soul there, because there is more of the Idea of The Good, because there is some glow of the light of The Good and this illumination awakens and lifts the soul and all that goes with it so that the whole man is won over to goodness, and in the fullest measure stirred to life.

(13) And the Sound or Noise in the turning Wheel, is now the Declarer or Pronouncer in all the Fountains, that the beloved Child is born; for it comes with its Sound before all Doors, and in all Essences; so that in its Awakening, all the Virtues or Powers are stirring, and see, feel, have smell, and taste one another in the Light, for the whole Birth nourishes itself in its first Mother, vis. the harsh Essence, being now become so thin [or pure,] meek, sweet, and full of Joy, and so the whole Birth stands in very great Joy, Love, Meekness, and Humility, and is nothing else than a mere pleasing Taste, a delightful Sight, a sweet Smell, a ravishing Sound to the Hearing, a soft Touch, beyond that which any Tongue can utter or express. How should there not be Joy and Love, where, in the very Midst of Death, the eternal Life is generated, and where there is no Fear of any End, nor can be?