(27) Thus you see that there is an eternal Root which affords this; and if you could bring the Colours and Vegetation or Growing into it, yet you could not bring the Smell and Virtue into it; and thus you will find in the Original of the Smell and of the Taste there must be another Principle, which the Stock itself is not, for that Principle has its Original from the Light of Nature.

(2) 'And as these juices have no discrimination, so that they might say, I am the juice of this tree or that, in the same manner, my son, all these creatures, when they have become merged in the True (either in deep sleep or in death), know not that they are merged in the True.

(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.

(3) Then he [i.e. Yajnavalkya] questioned them with these verses: — As a tree of the forest, Just so, surely, is man. His hairs are leaves. His skin the outer bark. From his skin blood, Sap from the bark flows forth. From him when pierced there comes forth A stream, as from the tree when struck. His pieces of flesh are under-layers of wood. The fibre is muscle-like, strong. The bones are the wood within. The marrow is made resembling pith. A tree, when it is felled, grows up From the root, more new again; A mortal, when cut down by death — From what root does he grow up? Say not 'from semen/ For that is produced from the living, As the tree, forsooth, springing from seed, Clearly arises without having died. If with its roots they should pull up The tree, it would not come into being again. A mortal, when cut down by death — From what root does he grow up? When born, indeed, he is not born [again]. Who would again beget him? Brahma is knowledge, is bliss, The final goal of the giver of offerings, Of him, too, who stands still and knows It. J For a similar comparison in Hebrew literature see Job 14, 7-10.

(6) But that God said, Thou shalt turn to Earth from whence thou wast taken, that is also very true; but the Understanding is [hidden] in the Word, and the earthly Vail hangs before it, we must look under the Vail. For Adam was taken out of the Earth, not out of the four Productions of the Elements, [but he was] an Extract out of the Element, which qualified [or mingled] with the Earth. But when he fell into the four Elements, then he became Earth, as also Fire, Air, and Water. And now what should the bestial Man do [with] the heavenly paradisical Fruit? He could not a eat of it; and therefore God does not cast his heavenly Kingdom to Beasts and Swine, but it belongs to Angels.

(338) As a tree, even though it has been cut down, is firm so long as its root is safe, and grows again, thus, unless the feeders of thirst are destroyed, the pain (of life) will return again and again.

(39) 1 have told you before, out of what Power the Tree is grown; viz. that it grew out of the Earth, and has wholly had Might. the Nature of the Earth in it, as at this Day all earthly Trees are [so,] (and no otherwise, neither better nor worse,) wherein Corruptibility stands, as the Earth is corruptible, and shall pass away in the End, when all shall go into its Ether, and nothing else shall remain of it besides the Figure. Now this was the Tree which stood in the Midst of the Garden in Eden, whereby Adam must be tempted in all Essences; for this Spirit should rule powerfully over all Essences, as the holy Angels, and God himself does.

(2) 'But if the life (the living Self) leaves one of its branches, that branch withers; if it leaves a second, that branch withers; if it leaves a third, that branch withers. If it leaves the whole tree, the whole tree withers . In exactly the same manner, my son, know this.' Thus he spoke:

(4) For no such Earth or Flesh as we carry about us can subsist in the Light of God: Therefore also Christ said; None goes to Heaven, but the Son of Man who is come from Heaven, and who is in Heaven. Thus our Flesh before the Fall was heavenly, out of the heavenly Limbus. But when Disobedience came, in the Lust of this World, to generate itself in another Center, then it [the Flesh] became earthly; for by the Biting of the earthly Apple in the Garden of Eden, the earthly Dominion [or Kingdom] took its Beginning: And the Mother of the great World instantly took the little World into its Power [or Virtue,] and made it to be of a bestial P Kind, both in Form and in Substance.

(2) 'In the same manner, my son, all these creatures, when they have come back from the True, know not that they have come back from the True. Whatever these creatures are here, whether a lion, or a wolf, or a boar, or a worm, or a midge, or a gnat, or a musquito, that they become again and again.

(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.

(11) The disciple's shadow is from that bough. When the shadows in the disciples cease, For, O fortunate one, how can the shadow move, Unless the tree that casts the shadow move as well? Again, the great Creator, as you know, Thus man passed from one order of nature to another, Of his first souls he has now no remembrance, In order to escape from his present soul full of lusts Though man fell asleep and forgot his previous states, Yet God will not leave him in this self-forgetfulness;

(3) You must not so understand it, as if it were extinguished in itself: No; but the Soul of Adam went out from the Principle of God, into the Principle of this World; and therein now the Spirit of every Soul is thus generated again by human Propagation, as is mentioned before, and it cannot be otherwise. And therefore if we would be fit for the Kingdom of Heaven, we must be regenerated anew in the Spirit of God, or else none can inherit the Kingdom of God, as Christ taught us faithfully; of which I will write hereafter, that it may be a Fountain for the Thirsty, and a Light to the noble Way, in the Blossom of the Lily.

(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.

(2) The father said: 'My son, that subtile essence which you do not perceive there, of that very essence this great Nyagrodha tree exists.