(13) Tat: Why, father mine! - do not the other lives make use of speech (logos)? Hermes: Nay, son; but use of voice; speech is far different from voice. For speech is general among all men, while voice doth differ in each class of living thing. Tat: But with men also, father mine, according to each race, speech differs. Hermes: Yea, son, but man is one; so also speech is one and is interpreted, and it is found the same in Egypt, and in Persia, and in Greece. Thou seemest, son, to be in ignorance of Reason's (Logos) worth and greatness. For that the Blessed God, Good Daimon, hath declared: "Soul is in Body, Mind in Soul; but Reason (Logos) is in Mind, and Mind in God; and God is Father of [all] these."

(1) Of language put into other people's mouths, nine tenths will succeed. Of language based upon weighty authority, seven tenths. But language which flows constantly over, as from a full goblet, is in accord with God. When language is put into other people's mouths, outside support is sought. Just as a father does not negotiate his son's marriage; for any praise he could bestow would not have the same value as praise by an outsider. Thus, the fault is not mine, but that of others. To that which agrees with our own opinions we assent; from that which does not we dissent. We regard that which agrees with our own opinion as right. We regard that which differs from our opinion as wrong. Language based on weighty authority is used to bar further argument. The authorities are our superiors, our elders in years. But if they lack the requisite knowledge and experience, being our superiors only in the sense of age, then they are not our superiors. And if men are not the superiors of their fellows, no one troubles about them. And those about whom no one troubles are merely stale. Language which flows constantly over, as from a full goblet, is in accord with God. Because it spreads out on all sides, it endures for all time. Without language, contraries are identical. The identity is not identical with its expression: the expression is not identical with its identity. Therefore it has been said, Language not expressed in language is not language. Constantly spoken, it is as though not spoken. Constantly unspoken, it is not as though not spoken.

(12) Tat: Most clearly hast thou, father mine, set forth the teaching (logos). Hermes: Consider this as well, my son; that these two things God hath bestowed on man beyond all mortal lives - both mind and speech (logos) equal to immortality. He hath the mind for knowing God and uttered speech (logos) for eulogy of Him. And if one useth these for what he ought, he'll differ not a whit from the immortals. Nay, rather, on departing from the body, he will be guided by the twain unto the Choir of Gods and Blessed Ones.

(14) I saw in my sleep what I will now say with a tongue of flesh and with the breath of my mouth: which the Great One has given to men to converse therewith and understand with the heart.

(12) For human speech is by nature feeble, and incapable of uttering God. I do not say His name. For to name it is common, not to philosophers only, but also to poets. Nor [do I say] His essence; for this is impossible, but the power and the works of God.

(16) Thereon [I say: Teach on], O Mind of me, for I myself as well am amorous of the Word (Logos). The Shepherd said: This is the mystery kept hid until this day. Nature embraced by Man brought forth a wonder, oh so wonderful. For as he had the nature of the Concord of the Seven, who, as I said to thee, [were made] of Fire and Spirit - Nature delayed not, but immediately brought forth seven "men", in correspondence with the natures of the Seven, male-female and moving in the air. Thereon [I said]: O Shepherd, ..., for now I'm filled with great desire and long to hear; do not run off. The Shepherd said: Keep silence, for not as yet have I unrolled for thee the first discourse (logoi). Lo! I am still, I said.

(17) The first will fashion it according to its fierce Might and Pomp, and mingles therein prickly [stinging] Sourness, Wrath and Malice. And the second Principle with the Virgin stands in the Midst, and sheds its Rays of loving Meekness therein, and resists the first [Principle.] And if the Spirit be kindled in that, then the Word is wholly gentle, friendly, and humble, and inclines itself to the Love of our Neighbour; it desires not to seize upon any with the haughty Sting [or Prickle] of the first Principle, but it covers the Prickles of the Thorns, and qualifies the Word with Clearness [and Plainness,] and arms the Tongue with Righteousness and Truth, and it sheds abroad its Rays, even into the Will of the Heart. And when the Will receives the pleasant friendly Rays of Love, then it kindles the whole Mind with the Love, Righteousness, Chastity of the Virgin, and the Truth of all those Things that are by all Regions tried upon the Tongue. And thus it together with the five Senses makes the Tongue shrill, and [thereby] the dear Image of God appears inwardly and outwardly, so that it may be heard and seen in the whole % Abyss, what Form it is of. O Man! behold what the Light of Nature discovers to thee.

(6) Then saith to me Man-Shepherd: Didst understand this Vision what it means? Nay; that shall I know, said I. That Light, He said, am I, thy God, Mind, prior to Moist Nature which appeared from Darkness; the Light-Word (Logos) [that appeared] from Mind is Son of God. What then? - say I. Know that what sees in thee and hears is the Lord's Word (Logos); but Mind is Father-God. Not separate are they the one from other; just in their union [rather] is it Life consists. Thanks be to Thee, I said. So, understand the Light [He answered], and make friends with it.

(3) "And that mystery of the Ineffable is moreover also a one and only word, which existeth in the speech of the Ineffable, and it is the economy of the solution of all the words which I have spoken unto you. "And he who will receive the one and only word of that mystery which I shall now say unto you, and all its types and all its figures, and the manner of accomplishing its mystery,--for ye are perfect and all-perfect and ye will accomplish the whole gnosis of that mystery with its whole economy, for unto you all mysteries are entrusted,--hearken, therefore, now, that I may tell you that mystery, which is [ . . .?].

(1) And ...] opened his mouth and [spake] unto the god 1

(6) Speech went off. Having remained away a year, it came back and said: c How have you been able to live without me?' They said: 'As the dumb, not speaking with speech, but breathing with breath, seeing with the eye, hearing with the ear, knowing with the mind, procreating with semen. Thus have we lived.' Speech entered in.

(1) 'Speech is better than a name. Speech makes us understand the Rig-veda, Yagur-veda, Sâma-veda, and as the fourth the Âtharvana, as the fifth the Itihâsa-purâna, the Veda of the Vedas, the Pitrya, the Râsi, the Daiva, the Nidhi, the Vâkovâkya, the Ekâyana, the Deva-vidyâ, the Brahma-vidyâ, the Kshatra-vidyâ, the Nakshatra-vidyâ, the Sarpa and Devagana-vidyâ; heaven, earth, air, ether, water, fire, gods, men, cattle, birds, herbs, trees, all beasts down to worms, midges, and ants; what is right and what is wrong; what is true and what is false; what is good and what is bad; what is pleasing and what is not pleasing. For if there were no speech, neither right nor wrong would be known , neither the true nor the false, neither the good nor the bad, neither the pleasant nor the unpleasant. Speech makes us understand all this. Meditate on speech.

(355) Speak concerning the word about God as if you were saying it in the presence of God.

(73) The irrational creatures do not make use of an obscure intimation, or hint their meaning by assuming a particular attitude, but, as I think, by a dialect of their own. And some others say, that if a fish which has been taken escape by breaking the line, no fish of the same kind will be caught in the same place that day. But the first and generic barbarous dialects have terms by nature, since also men confess that prayers uttered in a barbarian tongue are more powerful. And Plato, in the Cratylus, when wishing to interpret pyr (fire), says that it is a barbaric term. He testifies, accordingly, that the Phrygians use this term with a slight deviation.

(4) ' Let us hear what anybody may have told you,' [con- tinued Yajnavalkya]. 'Jitvan Sailini told me: " Brahma, verily, is speech (vac)"' [said Janaka]. 'As a man might say that he had a mother, that he had a father, that he had a teacher, so did that Sailina say, " Brahma, verily, is speech." For he might have thought (iti), '* What can one have who can not speak? " But did he tell you Its seat and support?' ' He did not tell me.' ' Forsooth, your Majesty, that is a one-legged [Brahma].' ' Its seat is just speech; Its support, space (akasa). One should worship It as intelligence (prajna)' ' What is Its quality of intelligence, Yajnavalkya? ' 'Just speech, your Majesty,' said he. c Verily, by speech, your Majesty, a friend is recognized. By speech alone, your Majesty, the Rig- Veda, the Yajur-Veda, the Sama-Veda, the [Hymns] of the Atharvans and Angirases, Legends (itika$a\ Ancient Lore (pur and], Sciences (vidya), Mystic Doctrines (upanisad)) Verses (sloka), Aphorisms (sutra\ Explanations (anuvyakhyand)) Commentaries (uyakkyana), what is offered in sacrifice and as oblation, food and drink, this world and the other, and all beings are known. The highest Brahma, your Majesty, is in truth speech. Speech does not desert him be noted, takes the active bruyat as if it were middle voice — a late epic usage. 2 A designation of the Atharva-Veda. who, knowing this, worships it as such. All things run unto him. He, having become a god, goes even to the gods/ { I will give you a thousand cows with a bull as large as an elephant/ said Janaka, [king] of Videha. Yajfiavalkya replied: 'My father thought that without having instructed one should not accept'

(1) I gave the Perfect Sermon (Logos) yesterday, Asclepius; today I think it right, as sequel thereunto, to go through point by point the Sermon about Sense. Now sense and thought do seem to differ, in that the former has to do with matter, the latter has to do with substance. But unto me both seem to be at-one and not to differ - in men I mean. In other lives sense is at-oned with Nature, but in men thought. Now mind doth differ just as much from thought as God doth from divinity. For that divinity by God doth come to be, and by mind thought, the sister of the word (logos) and instruments of one another. For neither doth the word (logos) find utterance without thought, nor is thought manifested without word.

(47) And we must further a consider, that when the Shriek [or Crack] makes its Dwelling-house, in its strong Breaking-through, out of the Gate of the anxious Darkness, viz. the Tongue, that the Shriek [or Crack] has not then yet seen the Virgin; but when it reflected [or shined] back again into the Heart, into the opened Darkness, and found her so habitable, there then first sprung up its Joy, and Pleasantness, and it became paradisical, and desired not [to go] into the Tongue again, but into the Head, and [desired] there to have its Region out of the Source of the Heart. Therefore the Tongue ought not in all [or altogether] to be believed, for it sits not in the heavenly Region, as the friendly pleasant Virtue [does;] but it has its Region in the Crack and Flash, and the Flash is as near the hellish Region, as the Crack is, for they are both generated in the Sharpness of the Stars, in the Essences, and the Tongue speaks both Lyes and Truth; in which of the two the Spirit arms itself, according to that it speaks: Also it many Times speaks Lies in great Men; when it is armed from the Essences, then it speaks in the Crack, like a Rider in his [haughty, surly, vaunting State,] or high Mindedness. The Life of the Soul. The Gate.

(1) They said to Speech: c Sing for us the Udgitha. 'So be it/ said Speech, and sang for them. Whatever pleasure there is in speech, that it sang for the gods; what- ever good one speaks, that for itself. They [i. e. the devils] knew: ' Verily, by this singer they will overcome us.' They rushed upon it and pierced it with evil. That evil was the improper thing that one speaks. That was the evil.

(5) But when we will speak of the Source [or Fountain,] and Joy of Paradise, and of its highest Substance, what it is, we have no Similitude of it in this World, we stand in Need of angelical Tongues and Knowledge to express it; and though we had them, yet we could not express it with this Tongue. It is well understood in the Mind, when the Soul rides in the Chariot of the Bride, but we cannot express it with the Tongue; yet we will not cast away the A, B, C, but prattle [or stammer] with the Children, till another Mouth be given us to speak with.

(16) Chapter IX. We have a magic writing, copied from that divine alphabet with which God writes His will upon the face of celestial and terrestrial Nature. With this new language we read God's will for all His creatures, and just as astronomers predict eclipses so we prognosticate the obscurations of the church and how long they shall last. Our language is like unto that of Adam and Enoch before the Fall, and though we understand and can explain our mysteries in this our sacred language, we cannot do so in Latin, a tongue contaminated by the confusion of Babylon.