(6) But in the cowl there nestles such a bird, That, if the common people were to see it, They would perceive what pardons they confide in, For which so great on earth has grown the folly, That, without proof of any testimony, To each indulgence they would flock together. By this Saint Anthony his pig doth fatten, And many others, who are worse than pigs, Paying in money without mark of coinage. But since we have digressed abundantly, Turn back thine eyes forthwith to the right path, So that the way be shortened with the time. This nature doth so multiply itself In numbers, that there never yet was speech Nor mortal fancy that can go so far.

(78) Now these three distinct dominions or regimens are generated in the seed, which taketh its original in the flesh, as I have mentioned before, within three leaves from this. Now observe this hidden secret hidden Mystery. Ye Naturalists, observe. The Gate of the great Mystery.

(49) But since Man is so slow of Apprehension, it may be, we shall not sufficiently be understood, and therefore we will once more set it down briefly and accurately, how these great Mysteries are; for we know what Adversary we have, viz. the Prince of this World; he will not sleep, but try what he can to suppress this noble Grain of Mustard-Seed.

(17) As has been stated elsewhere in this chapter, modern science now stands on the threshold of the discovery (by actual laboratory proof) that there is no such thing as "lifeless" matter—and that Everything is Alive. This has been the contention of the occultists for thousands of years. As a writer has said, it would seem that as in the case of the great Tunnel of the Alps, the two bands of workers, each on its own side of the mountain, were fast approaching the place where only a thin partition separated them one from another; and that already they can faintly hear the sounds of each others' picks penetrating the thin dividing wall between the two camps. The occultist may now safely await the day when modern science will actually "prove for him the old teaching of the esoteric schools." Moreover, science is coming very near to the place when it will perceive the truth of the old occult axiom that "All Power is Will-Power," and that the movements of electrons, atoms, molecules, and masses of matter are in response to an inward "feeling" resulting from the attraction or repulsion to or from other forms of matter, and the "will" action in response thereto, as Haeckel and Nageli (materialistic scientists though they may be called) have claimed for half a generation past. The contention of the Materialists that Life and Mind are but qualities of Matter, and are to be found in all forms of material objects, needs but to be inverted in order to show the Truth, long since uttered by the ancient occultists, namely that Matter is but the Outer Garment of Soul (Life-Mind), and that all material forms are ensouled by Life and Mind. The conception of the Materialists is but the Inverted Pyramid of Error, while the conception of the Occultists is the firmly placed, and soundly resting, true Pyramid of Truth—that Rock of Ages which can never be overturned, for it rests squarely and firmly on the Eternal Base of Being.

(14) Now Xenocrates, treating by himself of "the food derived from animals," and Polemon in his work On Life according, to Nature, seem clearly to say that animal food is unwholesome, inasmuch as it has already been elaborated and assimilated to the souls of the irrational creatures.

(79) This indeed has been partly concealed from the beginning of the world to this time, and man with his reason could not comprehend it.

(1) There are many other contentious innovations also, which may be the subject of wonder. But some one may justly be astonished at the contrariety of opinions produced by admitting either that the truth of divination is with enchanters, the whole of which subsists in mere appearances alone, but has no real existence; or that it is with those who are incited by passion or disease, since every thing which they have the boldness to utter is fraudulently asserted. For what principle of truth, or what auxiliary of intelligence, either smaller or greater, can there be in those who are thus insane? It is necessary, however, not to receive truth of such a kind as that which may be fortuitous; for this, it is said, may happen to those that are rashly borne along. Nor must such truth be admitted as that which subsists between agents and patients, when they are concordantly homologous with each other; for truth of this kind is present with the senses and imaginations of animals.

(1) The causes productive of scepticism are two things principally. One is the changefulness and instability of the human mind, whose nature it is to generate dissent, either that of one with another, or that of people with themselves. And the second is the discrepancy which is in things; which, as to be expected, is calculated to be productive of scepticism.

(22) Some things my treatise will hint; on some it will linger; some it will merely mention. It will try to speak imperceptibly, to exhibit secretly, and to demonstrate silently. The dogmas taught by remarkable sects will be adduced; and to these will be opposed all that ought to be premised in accordance with the profoundest contemplation of the knowledge, which, as we proceed to the renowned and venerable canon of tradition, from the creation of the world, will advance to our view; setting before us what according to natural contemplation necessarily has to be treated of beforehand, and clearing off what stands in the way of this arrangement. So that we may have our ears ready for the reception of the tradition of true knowledge; the soil being previously cleared of the thorns and of every weed by the husbandman, in order to the planting of the vine. For there is a contest, and the prelude to the contest; and them are some mysteries before other mysteries.

(66) Thus I also, what I do not enough describe in one place concerning this great Mystery, that you will find in another place; and what I cannot describe in this book, in regard of the largeness of the Mystery, and my incapacity, that you will find in the others following.

(7) Therefore it is that whenever there is great confusion, love of knowledge is ever at the bottom of it. For all men strive to grasp what they do not know, while none strive to grasp what they already know; and all strive to discredit what they do not excel in, while none strive to discredit what they do excel in. The result is overwhelming confusion. Thus, above, the splendour of the heavenly bodies is dimmed; below, the energy of land and water is disturbed; while midway the influence of the four seasons is destroyed. There is not one tiny creature which moves on earth or flies in air but becomes other than by nature it should be. So overwhelming is the confusion which desire for knowledge has brought upon the world ever since the time of the Three Dynasties downwards! The simple and the guileless have been set aside; the specious and the false have been exalted. Tranquil inaction has given place to a love of disputation; and by disputation has confusion come upon the world.

(41) Some years before his untimely death M. de Rougé read his translation of this chapter before the Académie des Sciences. It is much to be lamented that this has never been published. I have, in addition to the versions of other scholars, a copy of one by Mr. Goodwin, with whom I read this and other chapters nearly thirty years ago. But this kind of literature is not one of those in which his marvellous sagacity showed to advantage

(1) Let us now, therefore, to the utmost of our power, endeavour to discuss the manifold doubt concerning the peculiar dæmon, and which also is subject to various objections. Since, however, to speak summarily, the consideration of the peculiar dæmon is twofold, the one being theurgic, but the other artificial; and the one drawing this dæmon down from supernal causes, but the other from the visible periods in generation; and the one making no use whatever of the calculation of nativities, but the other meddling with methods of this kind; and the one worshiping this dæmon in a way more universal and supernatural, but the other partibly conformable to nature; this being the case, you appear to me to have absurdly transferred a more perfect sacred operation to one that is human, and in this to have exercised your inquiries.

(10) And the toil is followed by sweet discovery and reminiscence. On account of the heresies, therefore, the toil of discovery must be undertaken; but we must not at all abandon [the truth]. For, on fruit being set before us, some real and ripe, and some made of wax, as like the real as possible, we are not to abstain from both on account of the resemblance. But by the exercise of the apprehension of contemplation, and by reasoning of the most decisive character, we must distinguish the true from the seeming.

(2) In the first place, therefore, we shall divide the genera of the proposed problems, in order that we may know the quantity and quality of them. And, in the next place, we shall show from what theologies the doubts are assumed, and according to what sciences they are investigated. For some things that are badly confused, require a certain distinction; others are conversant with the cause through which they subsist, and are apprehended; others, which we propose according to a certain contrariety, draw our decision on both sides; and some things require from us the whole development of mystic doctrines. Such, therefore, being the nature of the subjects of discussion, they are assumed from many places, and from different sciences. For some things introduce animadversions from what the wise men of the Chaldeans have delivered; others produce objections from what the prophets of the Egyptians teach; and there are some that, adhering to the theory of philosophers, make inquiries conformably to them. There are now likewise some, that from other opinions, which do not deserve to be mentioned, elicite a certain dubitation; and others originate from the common conceptions of mankind. These things, therefore, are of themselves variously disposed, and are multiformly connected with each other. Hence, through all these causes, a certain discussion is requisite for the management of them in a becoming manner.

(35) The learned have had many disputations, questions, conceits and opinions concerning the fierce malignity and evil that is in all the creatures in this world, and even in the very sun and stars; moreover, there are some so very poisonous and venomous beasts, worms and vegetables in this world, that thereupon rational men have justly wondered, and some have concluded peremptorily, That God must needs have willed the evil also, seeing he has created so much that is evil; and some have laid the blame and fault thereof upon the fall of Adam, and some have imputed it to the work and doings of the devil.

(1) It is necessary that you should become scientific, either by learning from another person, or by discovering yourself the things of which you have a scientific knowledge. If, therefore, you learn from another person, that which you learn is foreign; but what you discover yourself is through yourself, and is your own. Moreover, if you investigate, discovery will be easy, and soon obtained; but if you do not know how to investigate, discovery will be to you impossible. And [right] reasoning indeed, when discovered, causes sedition to cease, and increases concord. For through this the inexhaustible desire of possessing is suppressed, and equality prevails; since by this we obtain what is just in contracts. Hence, on account of this, the poor receive from those who are able to give; and the rich give to those that are in want, both of them believing that through this they shall obtain the equal.

This however will be a rule and an impediment to those that act unjustly, viz. that men who possess scientific knowledge will appease their anger, prior to the commission of an injury, being persuaded that the perpetrators of it will not be concealed when it is committed; but that those who do not possess scientific knowledge, becoming manifest in the commission of an injury, will be restrained from acting unjustly.

(2) But to halt at these nearest determinants, not to be willing to penetrate deeper, indicates a sluggish mind, a dullness to all that calls us towards the primal and transcendent causes.

How comes it that the same surface causes produce different results? There is moonshine, and one man steals and the other does not: under the influence of exactly similar surroundings one man falls sick and the other keeps well; an identical set of operations makes one rich and leaves another poor. The differences amongst us in manners, in characters, in success, force us to go still further back.

Men therefore have never been able to rest at the surface causes.

One school postulates material principles, such as atoms; from the movement, from the collisions and combinations of these, it derives the existence and the mode of being of all particular phenomena, supposing that all depends upon how these atoms are agglomerated, how they act, how they are affected; our own impulses and states, even, are supposed to be determined by these principles.

Such teaching, then, obtrudes this compulsion, an atomic Anagke, even upon Real Being. Substitute, for the atoms, any other material entities as principles and the cause of all things, and at once Real Being becomes servile to the determination set up by them.

Others rise to the first-principle of all that exists and from it derive all they tell of a cause penetrating all things, not merely moving all but making each and everything; but they pose this as a fate and a supremely dominating cause; not merely all else that comes into being, but even our own thinking and thoughts would spring from its movement, just as the several members of an animal move not at their own choice but at the dictation of the leading principle which animal life presupposes.

Yet another school fastens on the universal Circuit as embracing all things and producing all by its motion and by the positions and mutual aspect of the planets and fixed stars in whose power of foretelling they find warrant for the belief that this Circuit is the universal determinant.

Finally, there are those that dwell on the interconnection of the causative forces and on their linked descent- every later phenomenon following upon an earlier, one always leading back to others by which it arose and without which it could not be, and the latest always subservient to what went before them- but this is obviously to bring in fate by another path. This school may be fairly distinguished into two branches; a section which makes all depend upon some one principle and a section which ignores such a unity.

Of this last opinion we will have something to say, but for the moment we will deal with the former, taking the others in their turn.

(7) But the esoteric schools of thought, and the occultists, were always insistent upon the principle that there was nothing lifeless in the universe—that everything was instinct with life in some form, degree, or phase. And, lo! modern science has at last reached the point where it is practically looking Occultism squarely in the face, in full agreement upon this important point. The old idea of a half-lifeless universe is fast passing away, and men of advanced science are beginning to whisper to each other that "The Universe is Alive, as a Whole and in all of its parts." Surely this is a remarkable change in scientific opinion.

(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.