(25) And thus thou earthly Man mayest see, how thou livest here in three Principles, if thy Mind inclines itself to God; but if it gives up itself to the Source of this World, then thou standest before Heaven, and thou sowest two Principles, viz. the Spirit of this World, and the fierce Source of Eternity. The Weil-Spring [or Fountain] of the Antichristian Kingdom.

(15) Now observe, the Heaven is the whole Deep so far as the Ethera, or Skies have given up themselves to the Birth of this World, and that Heaven is the Matrix, out of which Earth, Stones, and the material Water are generated. And there God separated the material Water from the Matrix; and here it is very plainly discerned, that the material Water is as it were dead, or has Death in it; for it could not abide in the moving Mother, but was created [to be] upon the Globe of the Earth, and God called it Sea, [Meer;] in which [Word] is understood in the Language of Nature, as it were a Springing [or Growing] in Death, or a Life in Corruption: Although herein I shall be as one that is dumb to the Reader, yet I know it very well, and I am very well satisfied therewith. But because the bestial Man is not worthy to know it, therefore I will not here cast the Pearl before the Swine; but for the Children of God, which will be benefited by it, the Spirit of God will certainly teach and instruct them in it. Note.

(30) But when we consider [or mean] the Original of the first Principle, then we find the [Nature, Property, or] Species of the Tree, and also the Will to the Tree. We find there the Abyss of Hell and of Anger [and Wrath;] and moreover we find the Will of all the Devils, we find the envious Will of all the Creatures of this World, why they all are the Enemies one of another, and do hate, bite, worry, kill and devour one another. My beloved Reason, here I will show you the Tree of the Temptation, and you shall look Moses in the Face: Keep your Mind stedfast, that you may apprehend it. 31.1 have often given you to understand in this Book already, what the Essence of all Essences is; but because it is most of all highly necessary in this Place to know the Ground [thereof,] therefore I will a set it you down all at large, and very fundamentally, so that you shall know it in yourself; yea you shall understand it in all Creatures, and in all Things that are, or that you look upon, or at any Time may possibly think on; all these shall be Witnesses. I can bring Heaven and Earth, also the Sun, Stars, and Elements for a Witness, and that not in bare Words and Promises only, but it shall be set before you [very convincingly and] very powerfully in their Virtue and Essence; and you have no Virtue [or Power, or Faculty] in your Body, that shall not [convince you and] witness against you; do but not suffer the lying Spirit, the old Serpent, to darken your Mind, who is the Inventor of a Thousand Tricks.

(24) By this you might find and understand the Ground, how the Kingdom of this World is generated, and how one Kingdom is in the other, and how one is the Chest and Receptacle of the other, and where yet there is no captivating at all, but all is free in itself: and Man stands manifested in all three [Principles,] and yet knows neither of them in the Ground, except he be generated out of the Darkness into the Light, and then that a Source knows the fierce Eternity, as also the Out-Birth of the Eternity. But he is not able to search out the Light, for he is environed therewith, and it is his Dwelling-House; whereas yet he is (with this Body) in this World, and with the Originality of the Soul in the Ground of the eternal Source, and with the noble Blossom of the Soul in the Kingdom of Heaven with God, and is thus rightly a Prince in the Heaven, over Hell and Earth; for the fierce Source [or Torment] touches it not; but the Blossom makes out of the fierce Source [or Quality] Paradise, [viz.] the high exulting Joy in the Springing up.

(2) And look thou have no wonder of this: for mightest thou once see it as clearly, as thou mayest by grace come to for to grope it and feel it in this life, thou wouldest think as I say. But be thou sure that clear sight shall never man have here in this life: but the feeling may men have through grace when God vouchsafeth. And therefore lift up thy love to that cloud: rather, if I shall say thee sooth, let God draw thy love up to that cloud and strive thou through help of His grace to forget all other thing.

(101) Behold, that which the Ancients have invented and taught, is not the Ground. They took upon them to measure how many Hundred Thousand Miles it is to P the Heaven whither Christ is gone. They did it to this End, that they might be Gods upon Earth themselves, as their invented Kingdom shows and declares, which stands merely in Babel. Behold, when we speak of the Thrones, it is quite another Thing than that they mean; and their Blindness and Ignorance is found, though there is a Spirit in their Knowledge which is not so much rejected; but that Spirit is not [or comes not] ex Ternario Sancto [out of the Holy Ternary,] out of the Body of Jesus Christ, but it is out of the high Eternity, which flies up above the Thrones; which may be mentioned in another Place.

(77) Thou wilt say, How? God dwells in Heaven. O! thou blind Mind, full of Darkness; the Heaven where God dwells is also in thee, as Adam was both upon Earth, and also in Paradise at once; and give not Way to Antichrist to direct thee aloft without [the Place of] this World above the Stars, for he tells thee Prophet David says: If I fly to the Day-break, or into Hell, thou art there. Also where is the Place of my Rest? Am not I he that fills all Things? Yet I behold the miserable and those that are of a broken Spirit, and I will dwell in them: Also, / will dwell in Jacob, and my Tabernacle shall be in Israel: Understand it right, he will dwell in the contrite and broken Spirit, which breaks the Gate of Darkness, he will press into that [Spirit.]

(45) But thou earthly Babel, what shall I write much of thee for? Indeed I must show thee the Ground, that thy Hypocrisy may be brought to Light, and that the Devil may not continue (in such a Manner) to stand in an angelical Form, and in the voluptuous Kingdom of this World (in Man) be a God, which is his highest Endeavour.

(17) But we should not here again wholly set down the Ground of the Deity, so far as it is otherwise meet and known by us, we account that needless [here,] for you may find it before the Incarnation of a Child in the Mother's [Womb or] Body. We set down thus much here, to the End that the Region of his World may be understood. And thus we give the Reader exactly to understand and know how the Region of Good and Evil are in one another, and how it is an imperishable Thing [or Substance,] so that one is generated out of the other, and that also the one goes forth out of the other into another Substance [or Being,] which it was not in the Beginning; as you may learn to understand this in Man, who in his Beginning, in the Will of Man and Woman, viz. in the Limbus, and in the Matrix, is conceived in the Tincture, and sown in an earthly Soil; where then the first Tincture A Desiring or Attracting. Dispels. (in the Will) breaks, and his own Tincture springs forth out of the anxious [or aching] Chamber of Darkness, and of Death, out of the anxious Source [or Property,] and blossoms out of the Darkness, in the broken Gate of the Darkness in it, as a pleasant Habitation, and so generates its Light out of the anxious Fierceness out of itself; where then (in the Light) there goes forth again the endless Source of the [Thoughts or] Senses, which make a Throne and Region of Reason, which governs the whole House, and desires to enter into the Region of Heaven, out of which it proceeded not. And therefore now this is not the original Will, which there desires to enter into the Region of the Heaven; but it is the preconceived Will out of the Source of the Anxiety, [which Will is a Desire to] enter through the deep Gate of God.

(65) And because I may not be well understood by the Reader, in that I write, that Man dwells in the Abyss of Hell with the Devils, therefore I will show him the Ground, that he may touch and handle it; and if he will not feel it, yet it is given to him that he may know it, and it shall be a Witness against him.

(62) The earthly Earth is like the holy Ternary, wherein is the heavenly Aquaster (viz. in the heavenly Earth, which I call the [one holy] Element) which is pure. Thus God is a Spirit, and the pure Element is heavenly Earth, for it is substantial; and the Essences in the heavenly Earth are paradisical Buds [or Fruits;] and the Virgin of Wisdom is the great Spirit of the whole heavenly World, in a Similitude, and that not only opens the great Wonders in the heavenly Earth, but also in the whole Deep of the Deity.

(1) HERE I must encounter with the proud and seeming conceited Wise, who does but grope in the Dark, and knows or understands nothing of the Spirit of God, and must comfort both him, and also the desirous longing Reader who loves God, and must show them a little Door to the heavenly Essence; and show them in what Manner they should understand these Writings, before I come to the Chapter itself.

(1) BUT now peradventure thou sayest, that how should it then be? For thee thinkest that thou hast very evidence that heaven is upwards; for Christ ascended the air bodily upwards, and sent the Holy Ghost as He promised coming from above bodily, seen of all His disciples; and this is our belief. And therefore thee thinkest since thou hast thus very evidence, why shalt thou not direct thy mind upward bodily in the time of thy prayer?