(67) But those waters shall in those days serve for the kings and the mighty and the exalted, and those who dwell on the earth, for the healing of the body, but for the punishment of the spirit; now their spirit is full of lust, that they may be punished in their body, for they have denied the Lord of Spirits and see their punishment daily, and yet believe not in His name.

(3) "O Shem, they are deceived by manifold demons, thinking that through baptism with the uncleanness of water, which is dark, feeble, idle, and disturbing, the water will take away sins. And they do not know that from the water to the water there is bondage, error, unchastity, envy, murder, adultery, false witness, heresies, robberies, lusts, babblings, wrath, bitterness. . . . Therefore, there are many deaths that burden their thoughts. For I foretell it to those who have understanding. They will refrain from the impure baptism. And those who have understanding from the light of the spirit will not have dealings with the impure rubbing. And their heart will not grow faint, nor will they curse, nor will they give honor to the water. Where the curse is, there is the deficiency. And the blindness is where the honor is. For if they mix with the evil ones, they become empty in the dark water. Where the water has been mentioned, there is nature, and the oath, and the lie, and the loss. For only in the unconceived spirit, where the exalted light rested, has the water not been mentioned, nor can it be mentioned.

(59) "Prescription. 5 Drops of this Water taken inwardly strengthens the understanding and memory, and opens to us most wonderful and sweet things, of which no man hath heard, and of which I dare not further write, because of the Oath I made God to the contrary. Time and the holy use of this blessed Water will teach us, as soon as you have taken it inwardly such influence will happen to thee as if the whole heavens and all the stars with their powers are working in thee. All Knowledge and secret Arts will be opened to thee as in a dream, but the most excellent of all is, you will perfectly learn rightly to know all creatures in their Nature, and by means thereof, the true understanding of God, the Creator of us, Heaven and Earth, like David and Moses and all the Saints of God, for the wisdom of our fountain of living Water will instruct thee as it did Solomon and the Brethren of our fraternity."

(35) The blood signifieth the water, and is from the water.

(55) For the astringent and fire-spirit holdeth it fast, and the meek water, which melteth from the body of nature in the kindling of the light, goeth through the severe, earnest, cold and fiery birth or geniture, and is very sweet, pleasant and lovely.

(1) 'Water (ap) is better than food. Therefore if there is not sufficient rain, the vital spirits fail from fear that there will be less food. But if there is sufficient rain, the vital spirits rejoice, because there will be much food. This water, on assuming different forms, becomes this earth, this sky, this heaven, the mountains, gods and men, cattle, birds, herbs and trees, all beasts down to worms, midges, and ants. Water indeed assumes all these forms. Meditate on water.

(101) Then thou seest that the body upon the root is dead also; for when the virtue is gone out of the root, then the body is but a dead carcass and can operate or effect nothing at all. And that is because the astringent spirit and the bitter have killed or destroyed the body of the water and attracted the fatness or unctuosity thereof to themselves; and thus they have drawn or sucked up the spirit thereof into the dead body.

(19) You must also mark the Form of the Water-Spirit; when that generates its like, so that it is predominant in its Regeneration or second Birth, and that a Center is awakened in it, (which itself in its own Essence does not awaken, but the other Fountain- Spirits do it therein,) it [the Water-Spirit] is still and quiet as a meek Mother, and suffers the other to sow their Seed into it, and to awaken the Center in it, so that the Fire rises up, from whence the Life is moved. In this [Form] the fire is not a hot burning [scorching] Fire, but cool, mild, soft and sweet; and the Bitterness is no Bitterness, but cool, mild, budding, and flowing forth, from whence the Forming [or Figuring and beauteous Shape] in the heavenly Glory proceeds, and is a most beautiful Substance; for the Sound also in this Birth flows forth most pleasantly and harmoniously, all as it were palpably or feelingly, or in a Similitude, as a Word that comes to be an Essence, or a comprehensible Substance. For in this Regeneration that is brought to pass in the Water-Spirit, (that is, in the true Mother of the Regeneration of all the Fountain-Spirits,) all is as it were comprehensible or substantial; although no Comprehensibility must be understood here, but Spirit.

(93) Water is a symbol of life; hence Plato and the gods before Plato, call it (the Soul) at one time the whole water of vivification, and at another time a certain fountain of it.

(1) "And many who wear erring flesh will go down to the harmful waters through the winds and the demons. And they are bound by the water. And the water will heal with a futile remedy. It will lead astray, and it will bind the world. And those who do the will of nature . . . two times in the day of the water and the forms of nature. And it will not be granted them, when faith disturbs them to take to herself the righteous one.

(25) There is also therein a raging, raving, stinging and burning, and that water is continually as a dying man, when body and soul are parting asunder, a most horrible anxiety, a woeful, painful birth or geniture.

(86) But when the sweet water can defend itself no longer, then anguish riseth up in it; just as in man, when he is dying, when the spirit is departing from the body, and so the body yieldeth itself captive as a prisoner to death; just so the water also yieldeth itself captive as a prisoner.

(16) Neither is the water of such a kind in God, but it is the source or fountain in the powers, not of an elementary kind, as in this world; if I should liken it to anything, I must liken it to the sap or juice in an apple, but very bright and lightsome, like heaven, which is the spirit of all powers.

(97) So in this exsiccation or drying up, the unctuosness or fatness in the sweet water is killed or destroyed, in which the fire kindleth itself, and so out of that unctuosity or fatness an astringent and bitter spirit comes to be. For when the unctuosness or fat in the sweet water dieth, then it is turned into an anguishing sweat, in which the astringent and the bitter qualify, mix or unite.

(2) It is acknowledged then by all men, that the oracle in Colophon gives its answers through the medium of water. For there is a fountain in a subterranean dwelling from which the prophetess drinks; and on certain established nights, after many sacred rites have been previously performed, and she has drank of the fountain, she delivers oracles, but is not visible to those that are present. That this water, therefore, is prophetic, is from hence manifest. But how it becomes so, this, according to the proverb, is not for every man to know. For it appears as if a certain prophetic spirit pervaded through the water. This is not, however, in reality the case. For a divine nature does not pervade through its participants in this manner, according to interval and division, but comprehends as it were externally, and illuminates the fountain, and fills it from itself with a prophetic power. For the inspiration which the water affords is not the whole of that which proceeds from a divine power, but the water itself only prepares us, and purifies our luciform spirit, so that we may be able to receive the divinity; while, in the mean time, there is a presence of divinity prior to this, and illuminating from on high.

(98) The meaning is not that the water dieth quite; no, that cannot be, but the astringent spirit taketh captive in its cold fire the sweetness or the unctuosity and fatness of the water, and qualifieth, mixeth or uniteth therewith, and makes use thereof for its spirit: Its own spirit being wholly benumbed, and in death, therefore it makes use of the water for its life, and draweth out the water's unctuosity or fatness to itself, and bereaveth the water of its power.

(32) 22 This is thy cool water, Osiris; this is thy cool water, O N., which went forth from thy son, which went forth from Horus. 22 I have come; I have brought to thee the eye of Horus, that thy heart may be refreshed by it. I have brought it to thee. It is under thy soles. 23 Take to thyself the efflux (sweat), which goes forth from thee; thy heart shall not be weary thereby. 23 To say four times, when thou goest forth justified: Libation; two pellets of natron.

(78) But now the Salitter of the earth and of the water is no more able to change or alter itself in its dead being, and shew forth itself infinitely, as it did in the heavenly place or seat; but when the qualifying or fountain spirits form the body, then it riseth up in the power and virtue of the light.

(3) Man's heart stands under the fire sign (8). The flames of the fire press upward. When both eyes are looking at things of the world it is with vision directed outward. Now if one closes the eyes and, reversing the glance, directs it inward and looks at the room of the ancestors, that is the backward-flowing method. The power of the kidneys is under the water sign. When the instincts are stirred, it runs downward, is directed outward, and creates children. If, in the moment of release, it is not allowed to low outward but is led back by the force of thought so that it penetrates th& crucible of the creative and refreshes heart and body and nourishes them, that also is the backward-flowing method. Therefore it is said: The meaning of the Elixir of Life depends entirely on the backward- lowing method.

(109) Now this sour spirit also stormed with all its powers against the sweet water, which was without, distinct from the body, in God's Salitter, and thought itself must needs be the prime and chief, and should in its own power form, frame and image everything.