(49) In thinking of Man, we must remember that primitive human beings—little removed from the apes—are as much Man as is the highest individual of the race today, or as will be his still higher descendant of tomorrow. And we must not forget that the Plane of Human Consciousness is closely linked to, and blended with, the Plane of Animal Consciousness, at one of its sides. The best scientific, and the best occult teaching hold that the man and the ape descended from some common ancestral form in the long ages past; the common ancestor was the trunk from which the Man branch sprung on one side and the ape branch sprung on the other.

(14) The Process of Evolution once begun, it proceeded rapidly. Higher and higher in the scale of manifestation rose the Things—in spiralic process, each spiral rising above the one beneath it, and yet each proceeding apparently in a circle, as do all proceeding things. In due time the first signs of the mineral kingdom began to show themselves, building upon the basis of the sub-mineral forms of matter. In the mineral kingdom began to manifest higher forms of life and mind—for, as the occultists know well, the minerals possess both life and mind in a certain degree. And then later appeared the first signs of plant life—forms but slightly above those of certain crystals.

(59) O, dear man, view thyself for a while in this looking-glass; thou wilt find it more largely to be read of concerning the creation of man. This I set down here for this very cause, that thou mightest the better understand the power of creation, and that thou mightest the better conceive and fit thyself for this spirit, and so learn to understand its language. The open Gate of the Earth. Now it might be asked, From or out of what matter or power and virtue, then, did the grass, herbs and trees spring forth? What manner of substance or condition or constitution has this kind of creature? Answer.

(25) Menasvus saith: May God reward thee for the regimen, since thou speakest the truth! For thou hast illuminated thy words. And they: It is said because thou praisest him for his sayings, do not be inferior to him. Andhe: I know that I can utter nothing but that which he hath uttered; however, I counsel posterity to make bodies not bodies, but these incorporeal things bodies.* For by this regimen the composite is prepared, and the hidden part of its nature is extracted. With these bodies accordingly join quicksilver and the body of Magnesia,t the woman also with the man, and by means of this there is extracted our secret Ethelia, through which bodies are coloured; assuredly, if I understand this regimen, bodies become not bodies, and incorporeal things become bodies. If ye diligently pound the things in the fire and digest (or join to) the Ethelias, they become clean and fixed things. And know ye that quicksilver is a fire burning the bodies, mortifying and breaking up, with one regimen, and the more it is mixed and pounded with the body, the more the body is disintegrated, while the quicksilver is attenuated and becomes living. For when ye shall diligently pound fiery quicksilver and cook it as required, ye will possess Ethel, a fixed nature* and colour, subject to every tincture, which also overcomes, breaks, and constrains the fire.t For this reason it does not colour things unless it be coloured, and being coloured it colours.} And know that no body can tinge itself unless its spirit be extracted from the secret belly thereof, when it becomes a body and soul without the spirit,* which is a spiritual tincture, out of which colours have manifested, seeing that a dense thing does not tinge a tenuous, but a tenuous nature colours that which enters into a body. When, however, ye have ruled the body of copper, and have extracted from it a most tenuous (subject), then the latter is changed into a tincture by which it is coloured.t Hence has the wise man said, that copper does not tinge unless first it be tinged. And know that those four bodies which you are directed to rule are this copper, and that the tinctures which I have signified unto you are the condensed and the humid,* but the condensed is a conjoined vapour, and the humid is the water of sulphur, for sulphurs are contained by sulphurs, and rightly by these things Nature rejoices in Nature, and overcomes, and constrains.

(3) Proceeding, therefore, in this way, in what remains of the present discussion, and fitly distinguishing the inspirations of the Nymphs, or of Pan, and the other differences of them, according to the powers of the Gods, we shall separate them conformably to their appropriate peculiarities; and we shall also be able to explain through what cause they leap and dwell in mountains, why some of them appear to be bound, and why they are worshiped through sacrifices. All these, likewise, we shall ascribe to divine causes, as containing in themselves all the authority of these particulars; but we shall not say that either a certain collected redundancy of body or soul requires to be purified, or that the periods of the seasons are the causes of such like passions, or that the reception of the similar, and the ablation of the dissimilar, bring with them a certain remedy for an excess of this kind. For all such like particulars are corporeal-formed, and are entirely separated from a divine and intellectual life. But each thing energizes conformably to its nature; so that the spirits which are excited by the Gods, and which produce in men Bacchic inspiration, expel every other human and physical motion; and it is not proper to assimilate their energies to those which are usually exerted after our manner; but it is fit to refer them to perfectly different and primordial divine causes. One species, therefore, of divine inspiration is of this kind, and is after this manner produced.

(3) On the whole earth plants grew up like hair upon the heads of men.

(15) But because the four Elements went forth now further out of the [one] Element, and made, with the Quintessence of the Stars, and with the Heart of the Essences, viz. the Sun, the third Principle, wherein also the great Wonders stood; and because there was no Creature found that could manifest those [Wonders,] but only that Image and Similitude of God, viz. Man, who had the chaste Virgin (the Wisdom of God) in him; therefore the Spirit of this World pressed so hard upon the Image for the Virgin, that it might manifest its Wonders, and possessed Man; from whence he first got the Name Mensch [Man] as a mixt Person.

(1) Consider, therefore, also another genus of causes; how a stone or a herb frequently possess from themselves a nature corruptive, or again collective of generated natures. For this is not only the case with these, but this physical power is also in greater natures and greater things, which those who are not able to infer by a reasoning process, will perhaps transfer the works and energies of nature to more excellent beings [ i. e. to Gods, angels, and dæmons]. Now, therefore, it is acknowledged that the tribe of evil dæmons has a very extended power in generation, in human affairs, and in such things as subsist about the earth. Hence, why is it wonderful that a tribe of this kind should effect such works as these? For every man is not able to distinguish a good from an evil dæmon, or by what peculiarities the one is separated from the other. Hence those, who are not able to perceive the difference between the two, absurdly reason concerning the cause of them, and refer this cause to genera superior to nature and the dæmoniacal order. If, also, certain powers of a partial soul are assumed in order to effect these things, whether such a soul is detained in body, or has left the testaceous and terrestrial body, but wanders about the places of generation in a turbid and humid spirit; this, indeed, will be a true opinion, but separates the cause of these things at the greatest distance from more excellent natures. By no means, therefore, is that which is divine, or any good dæmon, subservient to the illegal desires of men in venereal concerns. For of these things there are many other causes.

(32) IV. The Plane of the Animals Here, once more, we discover that there is no fixed dividing line between the adjoining Planes of Consciousness. Just as the Mineral Consciousness is closely blended into the Plant Consciousness, as we have seen, so is the Plant Consciousness closely blended into the Animal Consciousness. In fact, in the lowly forms of animal life it is almost impossible, at times, to state positively whether the particular form under consideration is a plant or an animal. Forms which science formerly considered "animal" are not placed in the category of "plant-life;" and other forms which science once held to belong to the plant-kingdom are now placed in the category of animal-life. The occultist recognized that these disputed forms dwell in the region in which the two respective planes blend and intermingle as has been stated before in these pages.

(10) Therefore all Arts and Sciences, [or Trades,] are (through the starry Spirit of this World) from God, manifested in Man, that they may appear in Wonders; and to that End God created this World, that his Wonders might be made manifest; and therefore God permitted, that Man is entered into the Spirit of this World, that he might manifest his Wonders through him. Yet he desires also that he should not misuse this World, but that he should go again out of this World into him; he desires that Man should be where he is. And therefore he instantly showed Adam and Eve their monstrous Form, by the bestial Cloathing which he put on them, per Spiritum majoris Mundi, [by the Spirit of the great World.]

(13) The adherents of Basilides are in the habit of calling the passions appendages: saying that these are in essence certain spirits attached to the rational soul, through some original perturbation and confusion; and that, again, other bastard and heterogeneous natures of spirits grow on to them, like that of the wolf, the ape, the lion, the goat, whose properties showing themselves around the soul, they say, assimilate the lusts of the soul to the likeness of the animals. For they imitate the actions of those whose properties they bear. And not only are they associated with the impulses and perceptions of the irrational animals, but they affect the motions and the beauties of plants, on account of their bearing also the properties of plants attached to them. They have also the properties of a particular state, as the hardness of steel. But against this dogma we shall argue subsequently, when we treat of the soul. At present this only needs to be pointed out, that man, according to Basilides, preserves the appearance of a wooden horse, according to the poetic myth, embracing as he does in one body a host of such different spirits. Accordingly, Basilides' son himself, Isidorus, in his book, About the Soul attached to us, while agreeing in the dogma, as if condemning himself, writes in these words:

(3) But they also depict them under the likeness of men, on account of the intellectual faculty, and their having powers of looking upwards, and their straight and erect form, and their innate faculty of ruling and guiding, and whilst being least, in physical strength as compared with the other powers of irrational creatures, yet ruling over all by their superior power of mind, and by their dominion in consequence of rational science, and their innate unslavishness and indomitableness of soul. It is possible, then, I think, to find within each of the many parts of our body harmonious images of the Heavenly Powers, by affirming that the powers of vision denote the most transparent elevation towards the Divine lights, and again, the tender, and liquid, and not repellent, but sensitive, and pure, and unfolded, reception, free from all passion, of the supremely Divine illuminations. Now the discriminating powers of the nostrils denote the being able to receive, as far as attainable, the sweet-smelling largess beyond conception, and to distinguish accurately things which are not such, and to entirely reject. The powers of the ears denote the participation and conscious reception of the supremely Divine inspiration. The powers of taste denote the fulness of the intelligible nourishments, and the reception of the Divine and nourishing streams. The powers of touch denote the skilful discrimination of that which is suitable or injurious. The eyelids and eyebrows denote the guarding of the conceptions which see God. The figures of manhood and youth denote the perpetual bloom and vigour of life. The teeth denote the dividing of the nourishing perfection given to us; for each intellectual Being divides and multiplies, by a provident faculty, the unified conception given to it by the more Divine for the proportionate elevation of the inferior. The shoulders and elbows, and further, the hands, denote the power of making, and operating, and accomplishing. The heart again is a symbol of the Godlike life, dispersing its own life-giving power to the objects of its forethought, as beseems the good. The chest again denotes the invincible and protective faculty of the life-giving distribution, as being placed above the heart. The back, the holding together the whole productive powers of life. The feet denote the moving and quickness, and skilfulness of the perpetual movement advancing towards Divine things. Wherefore also the Word of God arranged the feet of the holy Minds under their wings; for the wing displays the elevating quickness and the heavenly progress towards higher things, and the superiority to every grovelling thing by reason of the ascending, and the lightness of the wings denotes their being in no respect earthly, but undefiledly and lightly raised to the sublime; and the naked and unshod denotes the unfettered, agile, and unrestrained, and free from all external superfluity, and assimilation to the Divine simplicity, as far as attainable.

(6) Man (purusd), verily, is a sacrificial fire, O Gautama. The open mouth, verily, is its fuel; breath (prdnd), the smoke, speech, the flame; the eye, the coals; the ear, the sparks. In this fire the gods offer food. From this oblation semen arises.

(1) Let us, however, discuss what pertains to divination more particularly; not asserting this, that nature leads each thing to its like; for the enthusiastic energy is not the work of nature; nor again asserting that the temperature of the air, and of that which surrounds us, produces also a different temperature in the body of those that energize enthusiastically; since inspiration, which is the work of the Gods, is not changed by corporeal powers or temperaments. Nor must we say, that the much celebrated inspiration of divinity is adapted to passions and generated natures. For the gift of the proper energy of the Gods to men is impassive and superior to all generation. But since the power of the Corybantes is, in a certain respect, of a guardian and efficacious nature, and that of Sabazius appropriately pertains to Bacchic inspiration, the purifications of souls, and the solutions of ancient divine anger, on this account the inspirations of them entirely differ from each other.

(8) And it is excellently shown, that they had the Light of the Tincture in their Hands, wherein they found [their Inventions,] though it was not wholly known, for Sins were not then in such Multiplicity upon the Earth; and therefore the Mysteries were not so very hard and close hidden to them, but all was found out very easily; especially by Adam, who had the Mysteries yin his Hand, and was [but] entered out of the Wonders of Paradise into the Wonders of this World, who knew not only the Essences, and Metals; he knew also the Ground of the seven liberal Arts [arising] out of the seven Forms of Nature; yet not so altogether out of the Ground [or fundamentally.] But he was the Tree, out of which afterwards all the Roots and Branches grew.

(7) Out of the earth sprang up grass, herbs and trees; and in the earth, silver, gold, and all manner of ores came to be; and in the deep above the earth sprang up the wonderful forming of power and virtue.

(63) PuiLosopHus* saith: I notify to posterity that the nature is male and female, wherefore the envious have called it the body of Magnesia, because therein is the most great arcanum! Accordingly, O all ye seekers after this Art, place Magnesia in its vessel, and cook diligently! Then, opening it after some days, ye shall find the whole changed into water. Cook further until it be coagulated, and contain itself. But, when ye hear of the sea in the books of the envious, know that they signify humour, while by the basket they signify the vessel, and by the medicines they mean Nature, because it germinates and flowers.* But when the envious say: Wash until the blackness of the copper passesaway, certain people name this blackness coins. But Agadimon has clearly demonstrated when he boldly put forth these words: It is to be noted, O all ye demonstrators of this art, that the things [or the copper] being first mixed and cooked once, ye shall find the prescribed blackness! That is to say, they all become black. This, therefore, is the lead of the Wise, concerning which they have treated very frequently in their books. Some also call it [the lead] of our black coins.

(2) And immediately nature was divided into four parts. They became clouds that varied in their appearance. They were called hymen, afterbirth, power, and water. And the hymen and the afterbirth and the power were chaotic fires. And the mind was drawn from the midst of the darkness and the water—since the mind was in the midst of nature and the dark power—in order that the harmful waters might not cling to it. Because of this, nature was divided, according to my will, in order that the mind may return to its power, which the dark root, mixed with the mind, had taken from it. And the dark root appeared in the womb. At the division of nature the dark root separated from the dark power, which it possessed from the mind. The mind went into the midst of the power—this was the middle region of nature.

(93) Now in the dark body of man there is also such a regimen or dominion, as to the seven spirits, as there is in the body of the deep. And when the seven spirits qualify or operate according to the birthright of the Deity, then, out of the wrestling of the seven spirits, a seed generateth itself, according to their likeness.

(91) Timaeus: they sow upon the womb, as upon ploughed soil, animalcules that are invisible for smallness and unshapen; and these, again, they mold into shape and nourish to a great size within the body; after which they bring them forth into the light and thus complete the generation of the living creature. In this fashion, then, women and the whole female sex have come into existence. And the tribe of birds are derived by transformation, growing feathers in place of hair, from men who are harmless but light-minded —men, too, who, being students of the worlds above, suppose in their simplicity that the most solid proofs about such matters are obtained by the sense of sight.