(31) "All who come into the world, like a drop from the Light, are sent by him to the world of Almighty, that they might be guarded by him. And the bond of his forgetfulness bound him by the will of Sophia, that the matter might be through it to the whole world in poverty, concerning his (Almighty's) arrogance and blindness and the ignorance that he was named. But I came from the places above by the will of the great Light, (I) who escaped from that bond; I have cut off the work of the robbers; I have awakened that drop that was sent from Sophia, that it might bear much fruit through me, and be perfected and not again be defective, but be through me, the Great Savior, that his glory might be revealed, so that Sophia might also be justified in regard to that defect, that her sons might not again become defective but might attain honor and glory and go up to their Father, and know the words of the masculine Light. And you were sent by the Son, who was sent that you might receive Light, and remove yourselves from the forgetfulness of the authorities, and that it might not again come to appearance because of you, namely, the unclean rubbing that is from the fearful fire that came from their fleshly part. Tread upon their malicious intent."

(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.

(21) Right was thy thought, O thou! But how doth "he who knows himself, go unto Him", as God's Word (Logos) hath declared? And I reply: the Father of the universals doth consist of Light and Life, from Him Man was born. Thou sayest well, [thus] speaking. Light and Life is Father-God, and from Him Man was born. If then thou learnest that thou art thyself of Life and Light, and that thou [happen'st] to be out of them, thou shalt return again to Life. Thus did Man-Shepherd speak. But tell me further, Mind of me, I cried, how shall I come to Life again...for God doth say: "The man who hath Mind in him, let him learn to know that he himself [is deathless]."

(23) This is the dispensation of the universe, depending from the nature of the One, pervading [all things] through the Mind, than which is naught diviner nor of greater energy; and naught a greater means for the at-oning men to gods and gods to men. He, [Mind,] is the Good Daimon. Blessed the soul that is most filled with Him, and wretched is the soul that's empty of the Mind. Tat: Father, what dost thou mean, again? Hermes: Dost think then, son, that every soul hath the Good [Mind]? For 'tis of Him we speak, not of the mind in service of which we were just speaking, the mind sent down for [the soul's] chastisement.

(27) This when He'd said, Man-Shepherd mingled with the Powers. But I, with thanks and belssings unto the Father of the universal [Powers], was freed, full of the power he had poured into me, and full of what He'd taught me of the nature of the All and of the loftiest Vision. And I began to preach unto men the Beauty of Devotion and of Gnosis: O ye people, earth-born folk, ye who have given yourselves to drunkenness and sleep and ignorance of God, be sober now, cease from your surfeit, cease to be glamoured by irrational sleep!

(48) "Behold, I have revealed to you the name of the Perfect One, the whole will of the Mother of the Holy Angels, that the masculine multitude may be completed here, that there might appear in the aeons, the infinities and those that came to be in the untraceable wealth of the Great Invisible Spirit, that they all might take from his goodness, even the wealth of their rest that has no kingdom over it. I came from First Who Was Sent, that I might reveal to you Him Who Is from the Beginning, because of the arrogance of Arch-Begetter and his angels, since they say about themselves that they are gods. And I came to remove them from their blindness, that I might tell everyone about the God who is above the universe. Therefore, tread upon their graves, humiliate their malicious intent, and break their yoke and arouse my own. I have given you authority over all things as Sons of Light, that you might tread upon their power with your feet."

(2) "This is the spirit of light who has come in them. And by the will of the majesty the spirit gazed up at the infinite light, that his light may be pitied and the likeness may be brought up from Hades. And when the spirit had looked, I flowed out—I, the son of the majesty—like a wave of light and like a whirlwind of the immortal spirit. And I blew from the cloud of the hymen upon the astonishment of the unconceived spirit. The cloud separated and cast light upon the clouds. These separated so that the spirit might return. Because of this the mind took shape. Its rest was shattered. For the hymen of nature was a cloud that cannot be grasped; it is a great fire. Similarly, the afterbirth of nature is the cloud of silence; it is an august fire. And the power that was mixed with the mind—it, too, was a cloud of nature that was joined with the darkness that had aroused nature to unchastity. And the dark water was a frightful cloud. And the root of nature, which was below, was crooked, since it is burdensome and harmful. The root was blind to the bound light, which was unfathomable because it had many appearances.

(2) "And by the will of the greatness my equality was revealed, that what is of the power might become apparent. You are the great power that came into being, and I am the perfect light that is above the spirit and the darkness, the one who puts to shame the darkness for the intercourse of impure rubbing. For through the division of nature the majesty wished to be covered with honor up to the height of the thought of the spirit. And the spirit received rest in his power. For the image of the light is inseparable from the unconceived spirit. And the lawgivers did not name him after all the clouds of nature, nor is it possible to name him. For every likeness into which nature had divided is a power of the chaotic fire, which is the material seed. The one who took to himself the power of the darkness imprisoned it in the midst of its members. And by the will of the majesty, in order that the mind and the whole light of the spirit might be protected from every burden and from the toil of nature, a voice came forth from the spirit to the cloud of the hymen. And the light of the astonishment began to rejoice with the voice that was granted to him. And the great spirit of light was in the cloud of the hymen. He honored the infinite light and the universal likeness, who I am, the son of the majesty, saying, 'Anasses Duses, you are the infinite light who was given by the will of the majesty to establish every light of the spirit upon the place, and to separate the mind from the darkness. For it was not right for the light of the spirit to remain in Hades. For at your wish the spirit arose to behold your greatness.'

(6) "I understand mind, Hermes. You cannot be known, since you stay in yourself. I am happy, father. I see you laughing. The universe is happy. No creature will lack your life, for you are the lord of the inhabitants everywhere. Your forethought keeps watch. I call you father, eternal realm of eternal realms, great divine spirit, who through spirit sends moisture on everyone. What do you tell me, father Hermes?"

(2) Invoking then Jesus, the Paternal Light, the Real, the True, "which lighteth every man coming into the world," "through Whom we have access to the Father," Source of Light, let us aspire, as far as is attainable, to the illuminations handed down by our fathers in the most sacred Oracles, and let us gaze, as we may, upon the Hierarchies of the Heavenly Minds manifested by them symbolically for our instruction. And when we have received, with immaterial and unflinching mental eyes, the gift of Light, primal and super-primal, of the supremely Divine Father, which manifests to us the most blessed Hierarchies of the Angels in types and symbols, let us then, from it, be elevated to its simple splendour. For it never loses its own unique inwardness, but multiplied and going forth, as becomes its goodness, for an elevating and unifying blending of the objects of its care, remains firmly and solitarily centred within itself in its unmoved sameness; and raises, according to their capacity, those who lawfully aspire to it, and makes them one, after the example of its own unifying Oneness. For it is not possible that the supremely Divine Ray should otherwise illuminate us, except so far as it is enveloped, for the purpose of instruction, in variegated sacred veils, and arranged naturally and appropriately, for such as we are, by paternal forethought.

(2) And I do say: Who art thou? He saith: I am Man-Shepherd (Poemandres), Mind of all-masterhood; I know what thou desirest and I'm with thee everywhere.

(20) [For] Thou art God, Thy Man thus cries to Thee through Fire, through Air, through Earth, through Water, [and] through Spirit, through Thy creatures. 'Tis from Thy Aeon I have found praise-giving; and in thy Will, the object of my search, have I found rest. Tat: By thy good pleasure have I seen this praise-giving being sung, O father; I have set it in my Cosmos too. Hermes: Say in the Cosmos that thy mind alone can see, my son. Tat: Yea, father, in the Cosmos that the mind alone can see; for I have been made able by thy Hymn, and by thy Praise-giving my mind hath been illumined. But further I myself as well would from my natural mind send praise-giving to God.

(1) Mind: Master this sermon (logos), then, Thrice-greatest Hermes, and bear in mind the spoken words; and as it hath come unto Me to speak, I will no more delay. Hermes: As many men say many things, and these diverse, about the All and Good, I have not learned the truth. Make it, then, clear to me, O Master mine! For I can trust the explanation of these things, which comes from Thee alone.

(15) And he gave command to himself; he began to know himself and to speak with his mind, which is the father of the truth, concerning the unbegotten aeons, and concerning the virgin who brought forth the light. And he thinks about the power which flowed over the whole place, and which takes hold of him. And he is a disciple of his mind, which is male. He began to keep silent within himself until the day when he should become worthy to be received above. He rejects for himself loquacity and disputations, and he endures the whole place; and he bears up under them, and he endures all of the evil things. And he is patient with every one; he makes himself equal to every one, and he also separates himself from them. And that which someone wants, he brings to him, in order that he might become perfect (and) holy. When the [...], he grasped him, having bound him upon [...], and he was filled with wisdom. He bore witness to the truth [...] the power, and he went into Imperishability, the place whence he came forth, having left the world, which has the appearance of the night, and those that whirl the stars in it. This, therefore, is the true testimony: When man comes to know himself and God, who is over the truth, he will be saved, and he will crown himself with the crown unfading.

(10) When he finished praising, he called out, "Father Trismegistos, what shall I say? We have received this light, and I myself see this same vision in you. I see the eighth, and the souls in it, and the angels singing a song to the ninth and its powers. I see the one with the power of them all, creating those in the spirit."

(2) "For this cause have I chosen you verily from the beginning through the First Mystery. Rejoice then and exult, for when I set out for the world, I brought from the beginning with me twelve powers, as I have told you from the beginning, which I have taken from the twelve saviours of the Treasury of the Light, according to the command of the First Mystery. These then I cast into the womb of your mothers, when I came into the world, that is those which are in your bodies to-day. For these powers have been given unto you before the whole world, because ye are they who will save the whole world, and that ye may be able to endure the threat of the rulers of the world and the pains of the world and its dangers and all its persecutions, which the rulers of the height will bring upon you. For many times have I said unto you that I have brought the power in you out of the twelve saviours who are in the Treasury of the Light. For which cause I have said unto you indeed from the beginning that ye are not of the world. I also am not of it. For all men who are in the world have gotten their souls out of [the power of] the rulers of the æons. But the power which is in you is from me; your souls belong to the height. I have brought twelve powers of the twelve saviours of the Treasury of the Light, taking them out of the portion of my power which I did first receive. And when I had set forth for the world, I came into the midst of the rulers of the sphere and had the form of Gabriēl the angel of the æons; and the rulers of the æons did not know me, but they thought that I was the angel Gabriēl.

(8) Wherefore I've ever heard, my son, Good Daimon also say - (and had He set it down in written words, He would have greatly helped the race of men; for He alone, my son, doth truly, as the Firstborn God, gazing on all things, give voice to words (logoi) divine) - yea, once I heard Him say: "All things are one, and most of all the bodies which the mind alone perceives. Our life is owing to [God's] Energy and Power and Aeon. His Mind is good, so is His Soul as well. And this being so, intelligible things know naught of separation. So, then, Mind, being Ruler of all things, and being Soul of God, can do whate'er it wills."

(160) It becometh you to hasten unto the Light, and to the Rays of the Father, from whom was sent unto you a Soul (Psyche) endued with much mind (Nous).

(1) [Trismegistus] God, O Asclepius, hath brought thee unto us that thou mayest hear a Godly sermon, a sermon such as well may seem of all the previous ones we’ve [either] uttered, or with which we’ve been inspired by the Divine, more Godly than the piety of [ordinary] faith. If thou with eye of intellect shalt see this Word thou shalt in thy whole mind be filled quite full of all things good. If that, indeed, the “many” be the “good,” and not the “one,” in which are “all.” Indeed the difference between the two is found in their agreement,—“All” is of “One” or “One” is “All.” So closely bound is each to other, that neither can be parted from its mate. But this with diligent attention shalt thou learn from out the sermon that shall follow [this]. But do thou, O Asclepius, go forth a moment and call in the one who is to hear. (And when he had come in, Asclepius proposed that Ammon too should be allowed to come. Thereon Thrice-greatest said:)

[Trismegistus] There is no cause why Ammon should be kept away from us. For we remember how we have ourselves set down in writing many things to his address, as though unto a son most dear and most beloved, of physics many things, of ethics [too] as many as could be. It is, however, with thy name I will inscribe this treatise. But call, I prithee, no one else but Ammon, lest a most pious sermon on a so great theme be spoilt by the admission of the multitude. For ’tis the mark of an unpious mind to publish to the knowledge of the crowd a tractate brimming o’er with the full Greatness of Divinity. (When Ammon too had come within the holy place, and when the sacred group of four was now complete with piety and with God’s goodly presence—to them, sunk in fit silence reverently, their souls and minds pendent on Hermes’ lips, thus Love Divine began to speak.) II

(22) Hermes: Happy am I, my son, that though hast brought the good fruits forth of Truth, products that cannot die. And now that thou hast learnt this lesson from me, make promise to keep silence on thy virtue, and to no soul, my son, make known the handing on to thee the manner of Rebirth, that we may not be thought to be calumniators. And now we both of us have given heed sufficiently, both I the speaker and the hearer thou. In Mind hast thou become a Knower of thyself and our [common] Sire.