(16) For the Fruits were also good, and their Inclination [or that which made them to be desired] proceeded out of the inward Element, out of the Paradise. Now Adam could eat of every Fruit in the Mouth, but not in the Corruptibility, that must not be, for his Body must subsist eternally, and continue in Paradise, and generate a chaste Virgin out of himself, like himself, without rending of his Body; for this could be, seeing his Body was [proceeded] out of the heavenly Element, out of the Virtue of God.

(8) Besides, if Adam had eaten earthly Fruit, he must then have eaten it into his Body, and have had Guts [or Entrails:] And how could such a Stink [and Dung] (as we now carry in the Body) have been in Paradise in the Holiness of God? Moreover, he should by eating earthly Food, have eaten of the Fruit of the Stars and Elements, which would presently have infected [or qualified] in him, as was done in the Fall; also so his Fear over all the Beasts would have ceased. For the Essences of the Beasts would presently have been like the human Essences in Virtue [and Power,] and one would have domineered more strongly over the other.

(80) Now when Adam and his Wife had eaten of the earthly Fruit, then they were ashamed one of another, for they perceived the bestial Members for Propagation; and they broke off God went into the Garden, highly into their Minds, and they hid themselves behind the Trees in the Garden.

(7) Now we must needs clearly [conceive, or] think, that the paradisical Fruit which was good, was not so very earthly, for (as Moses himself says) they were of two Sorts; the one good to eat, and pleasant to behold, and the other had the Death and Corruptibility in it: In the paradisical Fruit, there was no Death nor Corruptibility; for if there had been any Death or Corruptibility therein, then Adam had eaten Death in all the Fruits; but seeing there was no Death therein, therefore the Fruit could not be so altogether earthly; though indeed it sprung out of the Earth, yet the divine Virtue of the second Principle was imprinted therein, and yet they were truly in the third Principle, grown [or sprung] out of the Earth, which God cursed as to the earthly Food, that no paradisical Fruit did grow any more out of the Earth.

(5) We must conceive, that there was then a very pleasant Habitation upon the Earth; for all the Fruits did grow [spring and bud] out of the hidden Element, through the Fierceness of the four Elements; and although the four Elements had also their Fruits, yet Man should not (but the Beasts of the Field should) have eaten thereof. But now when the Lord cursed the Earth, then the Element withdrew from the Root of the Fruit, for God's Cursing is nothing else, but this Flying from a Thing; and thus God's Holiness is flown from the Root of the Fruit, and so the Root [of the Fruits] remains in the four Elements, in the Out-Birth; and Adam and Eve were also fallen thereinto. And thus now like came to like; his Body also was become earthly, and must turn to Earth again.

(91) So now when Adam and his Eve (after the Biting of the Apple) beheld themselves, then they perceived the monstrous Image and bestial Form, and they felt in themselves the Wrath of God, and the Fierceness of the Stars and Elements; for they took Notice of the Stomach and Guts, into which they had stuffed their earthly Fruit, which begun to a take Effect, and they saw their bestial Shame; and then they lift up their Minds towards Paradise, but they found it not; they ran trembling with Fear, and crept behind the Trees; for the Wrath had stirred their Essences in the Spirit with the earthly Fruit, and then came the Voice of God in the Center of the Gates of the Deep, and called Adam, and said; Adam, Where art thou? And he said, Here I am: And I am afraid, for I am naked. And the Lord said; Who hath told thee that thou art naked. Hast thou eaten of the Tree, whereof I said unto thee, that thou shouldst not eat thereof? And he said, The Woman gave to me, and I did eat. And he said unto the Woman, Why hast thou done so? And she said, The Serpent beguiled me, so that I did eat.

(13) Therefore God here also gave him the Command, not to lust after the earthly Matrix, nor after her Fruit, which stood in the Corruptibility, and Transitoriness, but the Spirit of Man mot. He should eat of the Fruit, but no otherwise than of the paradisical Kind and Property, [and] not of the earthly Essences. For the paradisical Essences had imprinted themselves in all Fruits, therein they were very good to eat of, after an angelical Manner, and also pleasant to behold, or corporeal, as Moses also says. Now it may be asked, What then was properly the Tempting in Adam. The Gate of Good and Evil.

(33) So she pulled off an Apple and did eat, and gave to Adam also, and he eat of it likewise. That was a Bit at which the Heavens might well have blushed, and the Paradise have trembled, as it was indeed really done, as is to be seen at the Death of Christ, (when he entered into Death, and wrestled with Hell,) that the Earth and the Elements trembled, and the Light of the Sun was darkened, when this Bit of the Apple was to be a healed up. The Gate of the great Affliction, and Misery of Man.

(19) Now Man was to dwell upon the Earth as long as it was to stand, and manage [rule and order] the Beasts, and have his Illustrious or shining, Delight and Recreation therein: But he ought not to have eaten any earthly Fruit, wherein the Corruptibility [or Transitoriness] did stick. It is true he should have eaten, but only with the Mouth, and not into the Body; for he had no [Entrails, Stomach, or] Guts, nor any such hard dark Flesh, it was all perfect; for there grew paradisical Fruit for him, which afterwards went away, when he went out of Paradise: And then God cursed the Earth, and the heavenly Limbus was drawn from him, together with that Fruit, and he lost Paradise, God, and the Kingdom of Heaven. For before Sin, when Paradise was upon the Earth, the Earth was not bad [or evil, as now it is.]

(58) And then their Eyes were opened, and they knew that they had Flesh and Blood, and were quite naked. For the Spirit of the great World took them captive with the four Elements, and figured [or framed in] them Stomach and Guts; though indeed Or astral Spirit, in the Sleep of Adam (when the Matrix was severed from the Limbus) the same Forms were already figured, but they knew it not, till after the Biting of the Apple; and then the Spirit of the Fierceness first got in, and made its Region, as may be seen in the Heart, Liver, Lungs, Gall, and Bladder, as also in the Stomach; this Regimen had Adam got in his Sleep, and with the Biting of the Apple the Spirit of the great World has set itself in that [Government.]

(13) But you must clearly understand [or conceive,] that when the Fiat to the Creating [of the Woman] was in Adam, in his Sleep, his Body had not then such hard Grisles and Bones: O no; that came to pass first when Mother Eve did bite the Apple, and also gave to Adam; only the Infection and the earthly Death, with the fainting and mortal Sickness, stuck in them; the Bones and Ribs were yet Strength and Virtue, from which the Ribs should come to be.

(16) Adam had not eaten of the Fruit before his Sleep, till his Wife was created out of him; only his Essences and Inclination had eaten of it in the Spirit by the Imagination, and not in the Mouth; and thereupon the Spirit of the great World captivated him, and mightily qualified in him [or infected him.] And then instantly the Sun and Stars wrestled with him, and all the four Elements wrestled so mightily and powerfully, that they overcame him; and [so] he sunk down into a Sleep.

(36) But seeing it could not so be (because of the Spirit of this World) therefore was the outward Temptation first taken in Hand by the Tree of the Fruit of this World. And there Adam became P perfectly a Man of this World, and did eat and drink of the earthly Essences, and infected [or mingled] himself with the Spirit of this World, and became that [Spirit' s] own, as we now see by woeful Experience, how that [Spirit] possesses a Child in the Mother's Body in the Incarnation: For he knows not any where else to seek the Virgin, but in Man, where he first of all espied her.

(57) Thus now Adam with his Wife went (in great Lust and Joy) into the Garden of Eden, where Adam told her of the Commandment concerning the Tree: But Eve (being a Woman of this World) regarded it but little, and turned her from Adam to the Tree, and looked upon it with Lust; and the Lust instantly took hold of her; and the lying Devil (when she was talking with him, whom she knew not, neither had heard of any Devil) persuaded her, and she laid hold on the Tree, and broke off [an Apple,] and did eat of the Fruit of the four Elements and Stars, and gave to Adam; and when Adam saw that Eve died not, then he eat also.

(4) And now when he saw and knew by that which God had told him, that he should die and perish, if he did eat of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, it made him continually imagine that he was now no more the Child of God, and that he was not created out of God's own Essence or Substance, out of the first Principle. He conceived that he was now but a mere Child of this World, when he beheld his Corruptibility, and also the monstrous Image which he was in; and that the paradisical that his Spirit and Perfection were driven out of Paradise, (that is, out of the second Principle of God, where the Light or the Heart of God is generated from Eternity to Eternity, and where the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father and the Son;) and that he now lived no more merely by the Word of God, but did eat and drink, viz. the Birth of his Life henceforward consisted, in the third Principle, that is, in the [Region,] Kingdom, or Dominion of the Stars and Elements, and he must now eat of the Virtue and Fruit thereof, and live thereby: And upon this he then supposed, that he was past Recovery, and that the noble Image of God was destroyed. And besides, the Devil also continually represented his Corruptibility and Mortality to him, and himself could see nothing else, seeing he was gone out of Paradise, that is, out of the incorruptible holy i Geniture [or Operation] of God; wherein he was God's holy Image and Child, in which God created him to continue therein for ever. And if the merciful Love of God had not appeared to him again in the Center of the Birth of his Life, and comforted him, he would have thought that he was wholly departed, or quite separated from the eternal divine Birth, and that he was no more in God, nor God any more in him, and that he was no more of God's Essence.

(24) Thus it is shown us in the Light of Nature, that when Adam was thus impregnated [or possessed] from the Spirit of this World, then God built [or made] a Garden in Eden upon Earth, in the Paradise, and caused to grow up all Sorts of paradisical Fruit, pleasant to behold, and good to eat, and the Tree of Temptation in the Midst [of the Garden of Eden,] which had its Essences from the Spirit of this World; and the other [Trees and Fruits] had paradisical Essences.

(40) Besides, he was created by the Word, or Heart of God, that he should be his Image and Similitude, very powerfully in all the three Principles, [and be] as great as a Prince or Throne- Angel. But this Tree standing thus in the Garden, and of all the Trees that only did bear Fruit, therefore Adam looked so often upon it, because he knew that it was the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, and the Virtue of the Tree pressed him to it so very hard (which Virtue was also in him) that the one Lust infected [poisoned or mingled with] the other: And the Spirit of the great World pressed Adam so very hard, that he became infected, and his Virtue [or Power] was overcome. Here the paradisical Man was undone, and then said the Heart of God, It is not good that Man [should] be alone, we will make him a Help [or Consort] to be with him.

(35) And then Adam fell, and was feeble, which is called Sleep: This was the oTree of Temptation, [to try] whether it was possible Corruption. for Adam to live eternally in the Virgin, and to generate the Virgin again out of himself, and so generate an angelical Kingdom.

(9) Therefore it was quite otherwise with Adam; he was a heavenly paradisical Man, he should have eaten of the heavenly paradisical Fruit, and in the Virtue [or Power] of that [Fruit] he should have ruled over all Beasts [or living Creatures,] also over the Stars and Elements: No Cold nor Heat should have touched him, or else God would not have created him so naked, but like all Beasts with a rough [or hairy] Skin [or Hide.]

(27) But when Adam was infected from the Lust to eat of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, and that the Spirit of this World pressed [or swayed] Adam, where also the subtle Devil (which in the Spirit of this World slipt in) shot mightily at Adam, so that Adam became weary, and blind to the Kingdom of God; [then] said God, It is not good for Man to be alone, for he will not now bring forth the paradisical Virgin; because he is infected from the Spirit of this World, so that the Chastity of the Modesty is quite at an End; we will make a Help for him, to be with him, out of whom he may build his Principality, and propagate himself, it cannot be otherwise now; and he let a deep Sleep fall upon Man, and he slept.