(19) The true Heaven, wherein God dwells, is all over, in all Places [or Corners,] even in the Midst [or Center] of the Earth. He comprehends the Hell where the Devils dwell, and there is nothing without God. For wheresoever he was before the Creation of the World, there he is still, viz. in himself; and is himself the Essence of all Essences: All is generated from him, and is originally from him. And he is therefore called God, because he alone is the Good, the Heart, or [that which is] best; understand, he is the Light and Virtue, [or Power,] from whence Nature has its Original.

(14) But that we may so speak of the Heaven, that the Reader might come to understand what that [Heaven] is which God then created, [consider] what Moses writes of it. God made a Firmament between the Waters, and separated the Waters beneath the Firmament from the Waters above the Firmament, and the Firmament he called Heaven, which is very right; but hitherto it has been very ill understood.

(62) Therefore now if we will speak of our native Country, out of which we are wandered with Adam; and will tell of the Resting- Place of the Souls; we need not to scast our Minds far off; for far off and near is all one and the same Thing with God; the Place of the Holy Trinity is all over. Heaven and Hell is [every where] all over in this World, and the Man (Christ) dwells all over, for he has laid off the Corruptibility, and has swallowed up Death, as also that which is [fragile or] temporal, and he lives in God; his Body is the substance of the Element, which out of the Word of the Mercifulness, is from Eternity generated out of the Gates of the Deep; it is the Habitation, where the Sharpness of God breaks open the Darkness, where the eternal Virtue [or Power] appears in Wonders; and it is the Tincture of the Deity, which is before God, out of which the heavenly Virtues are generated; its name is wonderful; the earthly Tongue cannot express it.

(17) Now if we will lift up our Minds, and seek after the Heaven wherein God dwells, we cannot say that God dwells only above the Stars, and has inclosed himself with the Firmament which is made out of the Waters, in which none can enter except it be opened (like a Window) for him; with which Thoughts Men are altogether befooled [and bewildered.] Neither can we say (as some suppose) that God the Father and the Son are only with Angels in the uppermost inclosed Heaven, and rule only here in this World by the Holy Ghost, who proceeds from the Father and the Son. All these Thoughts are void of the very Knowledge of God. For then God should be divided and circumscriptive, like the Sun that moves aloft above us, and sends its Light and Virtue to us, whereby the whole Deep becomes light and active all over.

(121) In highest heaven. Know this for a surety. O beloved! Yet am I contained in the believer's heart! If ye seek me, search in such hearts!" He said also, "Enter the hearts of my servants To gain the paradise of beholding Me, O fearer of God." Highest heaven, with all its light and wide expanse, When it beheld Adam, was shaken from its place! Highest heaven is greatness itself revealed; But what is form when reality draws nigh? Every angel declared, "In times of yore

(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.

(14) Now therefore we say (as the Scripture informs us) that God dwells in Heaven, and it is the Truth. Now mark, Moses writes, that God created the Heaven out of the Midst of the Waters, and the Scripture says, God dwells in Heaven; therefore we may now observe, that the Water has its Original from the Longing of the eternal Nature after the eternal Light of God; but the eternal Nature is made manifest by the Longing after the Light of God, as is mentioned before; and the Light of God is present every where, and yet remains hidden to Nature; for Nature receives only the Virtue of the Light, and the Virtue is the Heaven wherein the Light of God dwells and is hid, and so shines in the Darkness. The Water is the Materia, or Matter that is generated from the Heaven, and therein stands the third, which again generates a Life, and comprehensible Essence, or Substance, out of itself, viz. the Elements and other Creatures.

(83) Then, as if paraphrasing the expression, "Heaven is my throne, and earth is my footstool," he adds: "But in great heaven, He is seated firm Upon a throne of gold, and neath His feet The earth. His right hand round the ocean's bound He stretches; and the hills' foundations shake To the centre at His wrath, nor can endure His mighty strength. He all celestial is, And all things finishes upon the earth. He the Beginning, Middle is, and End.

(2) When we passed beyond that place, we sent our minds up further. We saw with our eyes and heard with our ears hymns, angelic praises and angelic rejoicing. Heavenly majesties were singing hymns, and we rejoiced too.

(7) The whole Being of God is contained in God alone. The whole of humanity is not contained in one man, for one man is not all men. But in God the soul knows all humanity, and all things at their highest level of existence, since it knows them in their essence. Suppose any one to be in a beautifully adorned house: he would know much more about it than one who had never entered therein, and yet wished to speak much about it. Thus, I am as sure, as I am of my own existence and God's, that, if the soul is to know God, it must know Him outside of time and place. Such a soul will know clearly how near God's kingdom is.

(2) So, then, [man] hath his place in the more blessed station of the Midst; so that he loves [all] those below himself, and in his turn is loved by those above. He tills the Earth. He mingles with the Elements by reason of the swiftness of his mind. He plunges into the Sea’s depths by means of its profundity. He puts his values on all things. Heaven seems not too high for him; for it is measured by the wisdom of his mind as though it were quite near. No darkness of the Air obstructs the penetration of his mind. No density of Earth impedes his work. No depth of Water blunts his sight. [Though still] the same [yet] is he all, and everywhere is he the same.

(23) "Wherefore God truly dwells in our home. He dwells in us. How? The word of His faith, the calling of His promise, the wisdom of His statutes, the commandments of His communication, [dwell in us]."

(26) And Isaac answered and said unto him : " Behold, far from the dew of the earth shall be thy dwelling, And far from the dew of heaven from above.

(8) If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of heavenly things? And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven.

(60) Thus now the Heaven in this Forming or Framing, and the Framing and Generating out of it in infinitum, or endlessly, is the Paradise of God, as the highly worthy Moses writes: The Spirit of God moved upon the Water, in the Framing [Forming or Fashioning] of the World. This is, and continues so in its Eternity, that the Spirit of God (in the Birth of the Son of God) moves upon the Water; for he is the Virtue, or Power, and the Out-Flowing of the Father, out of the kindled Light- Water, out of the Water and Light of God.

(32) And He said unto him again : "I am the Lord who created the heaven and the earth, and I shall increase thee and multiply thee exceedingly, and kings will come forth from thee, and they will judge everywhere wherever the foot of the sons of men hath trodden.

(25) Reason (which is gone forth with Adam out of Paradise) asks, Where is Paradise to be had [or found?] Is it far off, or near? Or when the Souls go into Paradise, whither do they go? Is it in this World, or without the Place of this World above the Stars? Where is it that God dwells with the Angels? And where is that desirable native Country where there is no Death? Seeing there is no Sun nor Stars in it, therefore it cannot be in this World, or else it would have been found long ago.

(54) But while he thus stood (between the Kingdom of Hell and the Kingdom of this World) in the Paradise, bound with Bands, and yet also wholly free, in the Might of God, he [reflected himself into or] discovered himself in the great Deep of the Kingdom of this World; in which the great Wonders also stand hidden in the Center, as we see, that Man has (by his eternal Mind) discovered it, and brought it to Light, as is seen before our Eyes. And in his Discovering [or Reflecting] he imagined, and fell into Lust, for the Spirit of the World took hold of him, as a Mother makes a Mark upon a Child in the Mother's Womb, and [he] became (in the Lust) impregnated from the Spirit of this World, and then was blind as to God, and saw neither God nor the Virgin any more in his Mind. And thus the Kingdom of Heaven continued in the opened Gate of the Omnipotence, (in the Paradise) in its [own] Principle to itself (and the Virgin in it) hidden in the Center, and was in Adam, and yet Adam (with his Mind) was not in God, but in the Spirit of this World; and he became feeble as to the Kingdom of God, and so fell down and slept.

(2) Our Wit [Skill and Understanding] is so very hard bound up, that we have no more Knowledge of Paradise at all. And except we be again born anew by Water and the Holy Ghost, the Vail of Moses lies continually before our Eyes when we read his Writings, and we suppose that was Paradise whereof Moses said; GOD placed him in the Garden of Eden which he had planted, that he might till it.

(111) That he might know all that is written on those tablets, A11 that should be first and last to endless eternity He taught him, with the knowledge of his own 'names,' So that the angels were beside themselves at his instruction, The expansion of their minds, which Adam brought about, For the wide expanse of that pure mind The wide space of the seven heavens was not enough." The Prophet said that God has declared, "I am not contained in aught above or below, I am not contained in earth or sky, or even