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The Life and Doctrines of Jacob Boehme

By Franz Hartmann

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The Restoration of Nature and the Generation of Man

"If we speak about heaven and the birth of the elements, we are then not telling of things that are far away or foreign to us, but of that which is taking place within our own self, and there is nothing nearer to us than this birth, for we are therein as in our own mother. If we speak of heaven, we then speak of our home, of our own country, wherein the illumined soul can see, even if that country is hidden before the eyes of the body." (Principles, vii. 7.)

The Mosaic account of creation was never intended to be a history of the creation of the world from the beginning, but it is a history of the renewal or the restoration of the natural world that was formerly ruled by Lucifer, and which was thrown into disorder and convulsion by his desertion from God.

"Before the times of the wrath there were in the locality of this world the six sourcive spirits generating the seventh in a sweet and lovely manner, as is even now done in heaven, and there was growing therein not even a spark of wrath. All that was contained therein was light and clear, needing no other light, for the fountain of love within the heart of God was illumining all. Nature was then very ethereal, and everything therein stood in great power. But as soon as in nature the war with the proud devils began, everything took another shape and mode of action. The light became extinguished in the external generation, and therefore the heat became imprisoned in corporeity and could no longer generate its own life. From this cause death then entered into nature, and nature degenerated. Consequently another creation of light had to be inaugurated, and without that the earth would have had to remain in eternal death." 1 (Aurora, xvii. 2; iv. 15.)

Everything in nature was to bloom out and become newly-born, as may be seen by beholding minerals and stones, trees, grass, and herbs, and animals of various kinds, and although all these formations were perishable and not pure in the sight of God, nevertheless God intended to extract from them at the end of this time their heart and kernel, and to separate them from the wrath and death, and then that which had thus been regenerated was to bloom eternally, and to bear again celestial fruits outside of and beyond the locality of this world." 2 (Aurora, xxiv. 2 5.)

"The same sal-nitre" (the material basis or foundation), "which at the time of the ignition of the wrath perished in death, has at the time of regeneration been raised in the flash of fire. It has not become anything new, but merely another form of corporeity, which is now in a state of death" (existing relatively to us as gross matter). 3 (Aurora, xxii. 80.)

The outcast spirits, having produced in nature a state of ignition, God gathered together the essence of that nature, and thereby He withdrew it from the reach of those powers, putting a stop to their insolence by means of water.

"The outcast spirits were still in the quality of the Father, and therefore they ignited the quality of nature by means of their imagination, so that the celestial substance became earth and stones, and the sweet spirit of the water a burning sky. After this the creation of this world took place." (Menschwerdung, i. 2–8.)

Creation could not take place as long as all the elements were in a state of revolution; only after the "Spirit of God moved upon the waters of the deep" could the divine Word take form.

"When the eternal Word moved, because of the malice of Lucifer, and for the purpose of expelling this evil guest from his residence into eternal darkness, the essence was rendered compact (coagulated). God was not willing to leave the manifested powers, wherein Lucifer ruled as a prince, any longer in his command, but he caused them to enter into a state of coagulation and spued him out therefrom." (Mysterium, x. 13.)

"Therein consists the fall of Lucifer, that he awakened the mother of fire and wanted to rule over the benevolence in the heart of God. This fire is now his hell; but this hell God has captured by means of heaven—i.e., the mother of water. For while the locality of this world was to burn on his account in the fire, God moved to create, and created the water. From this has resulted the ocean and the unfathomable watery depth. So it was at Sodom and Gomorrha, for when their sin was great and the devil resided therein, desirous of maintaining his power, God permitted that the prince of this world ignited those five kingdoms with fire and sulphur. But while the devil imagined to be lord in that place, and to have there his dwelling, God thought of breaking his pride; He caused water to come there, and thus He extinguished his glory." 1 (Threefold Life, viii. 24.)

By His creative will, full of love, God caused the light to arise, and thus He directed the power of darkness downwards into the depths. Thus, when the soul of man rises up to eternal freedom, the powers of darkness disappear in the abyss below.

"The wrath did not touch the heart of God; but His benevolent love issues from His heart, penetrating into the most external generation of wrath, and extinguishing the latter. Therefore He said, Let there be light." (Aurora, 85.)

"When God spoke, Let there be light, the holy power which was conceived together with the wrath, moved, and the power of the devil was entirely withdrawn from him in its essence." (Mysterium, xii. 14.)

"Thus the darkness remained within the quality of the wrath in the substance of the earth, and within the whole depth of this world; and in the substance of light, the light of nature from heaven—i.e., out of the fifth essence, arose that whereof the constellation was created. This essence is everywhere, in the earth and above the earth." 1 (Aurora, xii. 15.)

By means of this new creation of the light, the new life had begun to stir everywhere; but this creation, in accordance with the number of the divine spirits which were active thereby, arrived at a state of perfection only on the seventh day. 2

"When God spoke the word, Let there be light, the essence, the being within the quality of the light, stirred not only within the earth, but also within the whole depth, in great power; wherefrom on the fourth day the sun was created—that is to say, ignited." Mysterium, xii. 13.)

"When God stirred to create this world, it was not that only one part moved and the other one rested, but there was all in motion at once." (Aurora, xxii. 122.)

"This motion lasted during six lengths of days and nights, when all the seven spirits of God were in complete and moving generation, and also the heart of all spirits, and the sal-nitre of the earth turned around in that time six times within the great wheel." (Aurora, xxi. 123.)

"The day's works refer to the seven qualities, six of them belonging to the actual regiment, but the seventh, or the essentiality, is that wherein the others are resting; for these qualities have been spoken out by God and rendered visible." (Mysterium, xii. 2.) 1

On the second day a separation took place in the power of the light, of the external material from the inner immaterial water, and the firmament (that which is firm) was put in the middle between these two.

"The water of life became separated from the water of death; but in such a way that in the time of this world they are linked together like body and soul. But the heaven, having been made from the middle-part of the water, is like an abyss between the two, so that the conceivable water is a death, but the inconceivable one is the life." (Aurora, xxi. 7.)

"The water upon the earth is a degenerated and deadly being, like the earth herself. This material water, contained within the most external generation, has been separated from the inconceivable one." (Aurora, xx. 27.)

"The water above the firmament is in heaven, and the water below the firmament is the material water." (Mysterium, xii. 2 4.)

"The firmament is the connecting link between time and eternity. God calls it 'heaven,' and makes a distinction between the waters; which is to indicate that heaven is in the world, but not the world in heaven." (Mysterium, xii. 23.)

Thus the mind of man is the connecting link between the celestial and terrestrial state. Heaven and happiness may be in his mind, but not his mind in an external heaven.

The spiritual and the material water are not separated from each other in an external manner, or according to locality, but wherever there is the material water, there is also the spiritual one, and it comes to aid the former.

"When I behold the external water, I am forced to say, 'Here in the water below the firmament is also contained water from above the firmament.' But the firmament is the middle, and the link (dividing line) between time and eternity, so that neither one of them is the other. By means of the external eyes, or the eyes of this world, I see only the water below the firmament; but the water above the firmament is that which God in Christ has instituted for the baptism of regeneration." (Mysterium, xii. 26.)

"All the water in this world is degenerated, and therefore the upper water must come to the aid of the earth, and extinguish her fire and pacify her, so that the true water may be born." (Aurora, xx. 33.)

Divine inspiration must come to the aid of the material thought, so that heavenly thoughts may be born.

On the third day the fiery and the watery essence, the firmament of heaven and the earth, entered again in Conjunction, and from this there were born grasses and herbs and trees, and at the same time there were also formed gold and silver and ores of various kinds. 1

"On the second day God separated the watery and the fiery mercury from each other, and called the fiery one the firmament of heaven. Then in the spirit of external nature there originated a male and a female kind—namely, in the fiery Mercury the male, and in the watery the female one." (Clavis, 86.)

"On the third day the fiery and the watery Mercury have again entered in conjunction and mixture, and then the sal-nitre gave birth to grasses and herbs and trees." (Clavis, 88.)

"After God had put heaven between the love and the wrath, for the purpose of discernment, there on the third day love penetrated through heaven into the wrath. Then the old and deadened body began to stir and to feel the anguish of generation; for love is ardent, and it ignited the fountain of fire, and the latter caused a friction in the acrid and cold quality of stiffened death, until on the third day the acrid quality became heated, and thus the acrid earth became moveable. (Aurora, xxv. 29).

"When the light contained in the sweet water penetrated through the acrid spirit, the lightning flash, having become ignited in the water, in the acrid, hard, and dead quality, it caused motion in everything, and thus came movability (life) into existence, not only in the heaven above the earth, but also at the same time within the earth. Then there began life to be generated in all things, and from the earth were produced grass, herbs, and trees, and within the earth there were formed silver, gold, and metals of various kinds." (Aurora, xxi, 132; xx. 6.)

As the light could be active only in the corrupted essence, there being none other, the products formed thereby were of a mixed kind, half good and half evil.

"When the light appeared again within the external conceivableness, the Word brought forth life out of death, and the corrupted sal-nitre produced fruits again; but this had to take place in a certain relation to the depraved state existing in the wrath, and as the external forthcoming of those fruits took place from the earth, they had to become evil and good." (Aurora, xxi. 19.)

Before the ignition of the sun and the stars took place nature was resting as in a state of death, and the formations proceeding from her were devoid of the living, growth-producing power.

"Until the third day after the ignition of the wrath of God in this world, nature remained in anxiety, and was a dark valley in death; but on the third day, when the light of the stars became ignited in the water of life, the life broke through death, and the new generation began." (Aurora, xxiv. 41.)

"In the earth there is above all the acrid quality. This contracts the sal-nitre and solidifies the earth, causing it to become a corporeal being, forming therein also bodies of various kinds, such as rocks, metals, and manifold roots. When this is formed it has nevertheless no life to enable it to grow and expand. But when the heat of the sun acts upon the soil, various formations prosper and grow in the earth." (Aurora, viii. 41.)

Likewise the material and earthly elements in man have no power themselves to rise superior to their own nature. This they can do in no other way than by the power of the Divine Spirit.

Now the eternal light of God shone into the darkness of this world and ignited the heat in the firmament or heaven, and thus out of the fire arose the light—that is to say, the sun and the starry sky.

"After the heaven had been made, for the sake of distinction between the light of God and the corrupted body of this world, the latter was a dark valley and without light, and all the powers were captured, as if in death, and very uneasy until they became kindled in the midst of the whole body. But when this took place the love in the light of God broke through that heaven of division and ignited the heat." (Aurora, xxv. 68.)

"God, the eternal light and the eternal will, shines within the darkness, and the darkness has captured the will (received its activity). In this will arises now the anxiety, and in this is the fire, and in the fire the light. Thus from the fire the stars have been produced, and from the power of the heavens the sun." (Three Principles, viii. 22.)

All this takes place in a corresponding manner during the spiritual regeneration of man.

Thereby divine Wisdom has manifested itself, not in an entirely pure, and therefore not permanent and immutable manner, but nevertheless as in a clear mirror, and it thereby drove the devil backward deep into his darkness.

"On the fourth day God, out of His eternal wisdom, created the lord of the third principle (the visible world), the sun and the stars. Herein is now truly seen the Godhead and the eternal wisdom of God, as in a clear mirror. This being, visible before our eyes, is not God Himself, but a God in the third principle, which will ultimately return to his ether and take an end." (Three Principles, viii. 13.)

"God has made a solid foundation (firmament) called 'heaven,' between the most external and the most internal generation, between the clear Godhead and corrupted nature, through which one must break if one wants to go to God. Of this foundation it is said (Hiob. xiv. 15) that even the heavens are not pure before God, but on the day of judgment the wrath shall be swept therefrom." 1 (Aurora, xx. 41.)

"At the time of creation another light, the sun, was awakened in this world, it having been corrupted by Lucifer, and thereby the splendour of the devil was taken away. Thus he has been shut in like a prisoner into the darkness between the realm of God and the realm of this world, so that he has no longer anything to rule over in this world, except in the Turba, wherein is awakened the wrath and anger of God." (Menschwerdung, i. 2.)

The sun has been revealed by means of the soul of the world, and is made of the influences of all the stars. He is also the life of all the stars. Thus the sun of divine Wisdom in man is representing the collective knowledge which man has gathered from his experiences, having as a basis his own divine self-consciousness. Without that self-consciousness in God all his intellectual acquisitions are merely vapoury, and will pass away.

"In the soul of the external world, and by means of it, God has awakened a king, or, as I would wish to call it symbolically, a natural deity, together with six councillors, to be his assistants, namely, the sun and the six other planets, which were spoken out of the seven qualities from the locus (seat or centre) of the sun. The sun receives his splendour from the tincture of the fire-world and the world of light, and is manifested as a revealed point in relation to the world of fire." (Mysterium, xiii. 16.)

"In the death in the centre—that is to say, in the body or the corporeal substance of the earth, God has awakened the tincture, its lustre, splendour, and light, wherein is contained the life of the earth; but to the depth above the centre He has given the sun, which is a tincture of the fire, and which, with its power, reaches into the freedom outside and beyond nature, and from which nature receives its splendour. He is the life of the whole circle of stars, and all these stars are His children. Not that he contains their essences, but their life arose from his centre in the beginning." (Threefold Life, iv. 27.)

"The sun is the heart of all the powers in this world, and is configurated from the powers of all the stars, while, on the other hand, he illuminates and vivifies all the stars and powers in this world." (Aurora, vii. 42.)

Thus the divine principle in man furnishes the intellect with light and life in the same sense as the sun reflects his light upon the moon. An intellect which has been deserted by God will perish after its accumulated strength is exhausted. Only that which God knows in us remains permanent.

"The sun is in the midst of the depth, and is, so to say, the light or heart of the stars, extracted from all their powers by the power of God, and brought into form Therefore is he the clearest light of all, and by his lustre and heat he ignites all the stars, each one according to its own special quality and power." (Threefold Life, vii. 40.)

"This is not to be understood as if by calling the sun the centre we meant to say that all the stars were originated from a central point, called the 'sun.' The sun is the centre of the powers of the stars, and the cause why they move in their essence. He unfolds their powers and puts his power into them, and this power constitutes their heart." (Mysterium, xi. 32.)

Especially have the seven planets become objective by means of the sun, and in accordance with and corresponding to the seven forms of nature.

"As the sun is the heart of the life and an origin of all the spirits in the body of this world, likewise is Saturn a beginning of all corporeity and tangibility. Thus he does not derive his beginning and descent from the sun, but his origin is the earnest, acrid, and severe anxiety of the whole body of this world." (Aurora, xxvi. 1.)

"When the light became ignited, the conquered power in the astringency became Mercury." (Three Principles, viii. 24.)

"Mercury is an agitator, sound-maker, ringer; but he leas not yet the true life. The latter originates in the fire. Thus he desires the fierce and storming essence, to cause fire to appear, and this is Mars." (Threefold Life, ix. 78.) " When the sun became ignited, the terrible fire-flash went from the locality of the sun in an upward direction like a furious stroke of lightning, and this became Mars. He is now there as a tyrant, a raging element, a mover of the whole body of this world, so that all life takes its origin of him." (Aurora, xxv. 72.)

"As soon as the spirits of motion and life, by means of the ignition of the water, arose from the locality of the sun, mildness, being the basis of the water, penetrated, endowed with the power of light, in a downward direction, after the manner of meekness, and from this the planet Venus came into existence." (Aurora, xxvi. 19–33.)

"When the fiery terror was captured by the light, the light, by its own power, and being a mild, exalting life, penetrated still higher upwards into the depth, until it arrived in the hard and cold seat of nature. There it remained, and from that power the planet Jupiter came into existence." (Aurora, xxv. 76–82.)

"The seventh form is Luna, wherein are contained the qualities of all the six forms. She is, so to say, the corporeal being of the other forms, all of which throw into her their desire by means of Sol. That which Sol (the sun) is spiritually becomes corporeal in Luna (the moon)." (Signature, ix. 24.)

 

After the world of stars had begun to exist, the sidereal life appeared by the power of the former—that is to say, that living organisms were produced, representing, so to speak, "stars of the various elements."

"The firmament of heaven, having been made from the medium of the water, this generation penetrates through the external, congealed generation—that is to say, through death, and brings forth the sidereal life, such as animals and men, birds, fishes, and worms." (Aurora, xx. 60.)

"After God had unfolded the stars and the four elements, there were produced creatures in all the four elements, such as birds in the constellation of the air, fishes in the constellation of the water, animals and four-legged beings in the constellation of earth, and spirits in that of the fire." 1 (Mysterium, xliv. 1.)

These creatures received their spirit from the stars, or rather from the spirit of this world, but their body they received from the earth. According to the predominance of the fiery or the watery form, there resulted also an antithesis of sex.

"By the power of His word, Fiat, God caused all beings to come forth from the matrix of nature on the fifth day, all according to their qualities; the fishes in the water, the birds in the air, the other animals upon the earth. They received their corporeity from the fixedness (rigidity) of the earth, and their spirit from the Spiritus Mundi." (Grace, v. 20.)

"All creatures have been created of the life below and the life above. The matrix of the earth gave the body, and the stars the spirit." (Threefold Life, xi. 7.)

"As the spirit of the stars, or the spirit in the fire-form, by the power of its longing, became mixed with the watery one, there resulted two senses from one and the same essence. The one, the male, in a fiery, and the other, the female, in a watery shape (state)." 1 (Three Principles, viii. 43.)

Finally, man was created, and out of him there was to come forth a celestial army, and in the midst of the time its king, in the place of the outcast Lucifer.

"God willed to create an angelic army. Thus He created Adam, and he was to generate out of his own body creatures of his own kind; but in the midst of the time there was to be born out of the body of a man the King of all men, and He was to take possession of the new kingdom as a ruler over these created beings, in the place of the degenerated and outcast Lucifer." 2 (Aurora, xxiv. 18.)

Man, however, was to surpass the angels (in perfection), for he was to be a complete image of divine glory, while the angels have been created out of only two principles.

"Adam was to be a perfect symbol of God, created out of the eternal Magia, the substance of God; he was to be something made out of the nothing, out of the spirit—the ideal—into the body." (Menschwerdung, i. 5.)

"The angels are created out of two principles, but the soul, with the body of the outer life, out of three principles. Therefore man is higher than the angels, provided that he remains in God." (Forty Questions, i. 263.)

"We human beings are a far greater mystery than the angels, and we shall surpass them in celestial wisdom. They are fire-flames, illumined by the light of God, but we attain the great fountain of meekness and love which is welling up within the holy essentiality of God." 1 (Menschwerdung, i. 5.)

Man comprises all three principles: the principle of darkness or fire, from which originates his soul; the principle of light, from which his spirit originates; and the third principle, which is the basic element of his body.

"In the life of man there are three states to be distinguished from each other—first, the innermost, that is to say, God being eternally hidden within the fire; secondly, the middle part, which from eternity has stood as an image or likeness in the wonders of God, comparable to a person seeing himself in a mirror; thirdly, has this living image received still another mirror in creation wherein to behold itself, namely, the spirit of the external world, or the third principle, which is also a form (state) of the Eternal." (Threefold Life, xviii. 4.)

"The darkness in man longing for light is the first principle; the power of the light the second; and the longing power which attracts and becomes full (substantial), and whereof the material body grows, is the third principle." (Three Principles, vii. 26.)

"The soul, or the first principle, is founded on the fire of eternal nature; the spirit, or the second principle, roots in the light; and the body is the third principle, or the substantiality of the visible world." 1 (Tabulæ Principiæ, 65.)

Adam was to rule over all nature, and therefore his body was taken from all the powers of the external world; but the third principle, as well as the first one, appeared in him subject to the second, the light.

"If you will behold your own self and the outer world, and what is taking place therein, you will find that you, with regard to your external being, are that external world. You are a little world formed out of the large one, and your external light is a chaos of the sun and the constellation of stars. If this were not so, you would not be able to see by means of the light of the sun." 2 (Mysterium, ii. 5.)

"If man, as the image of God, is to rule over the fishes and fowls, the animals, and the whole of the earth, as well as over the essence of all the stars, then must he be out of all three, for each spirit can rule only in his mother, wherein he originated." (Mysterium, xiv. 8.)

"Terrestrial man had in. his constitution the kingdom of this world, but there were not ruling in him the four elements (separately); but they were in one, and the terrestrial order of things was hidden in him. He was to live in celestial state, and although everything was stirring (alive) within him, nevertheless he was to rule over the terrestrial anguish (external consciousness) by means of the celestial quality (inner consciousness) of the other (second) principle, and to retain dominion over the kingdom of the stars and elements by means of the Paradisiacal quality." (Menschwerdung, i. 2.)

Man must rise, not merely in his imagination, but with his will, above all that which is earthly, sensual, or merely intellectual, if he desires to be a power in the kingdom of the Spirit. Thus will the ideal become real to him.

"Adam's body (the ethereal body of aboriginal man) was created out of the four elements of external nature, and out of the (essences of the) stars, by means of the eternal Fiat. Thus he was in possession of divine and terrestrial essentiality; but the terrestrial one was in the divine one like consumed or impotent (latent). The substance or the matter from which the body was made or created contained itself also the first principle within itself, but it was not stirring therein." (Menschwerdung, i. 3, 15.)

"As God resides within Himself and penetrates through all His works, incomprehensible to the latter, and without His being affected by anything, likewise His image (man) originated from the pure element. He also was created in this world; but the kingdom of this world was not to comprehend him, but he was to rule powerfully in this world by means of the essences from the pure element." (Three Principles, xxii. 15.)

The expression that God created man from a clod of clay is not to be taken in any other sense than that God, by means of desire, drew together all the terrestrial qualities.

"If Moses says that God created man out of a clod of clay, and that he breathed into him the living breath, this is not to be understood as if God had acted in a personal manner—standing there like a man and taking up a lump of earth and making a body out of it; but the Fiat, that is to say, the desire of the Word, was contained within the eternally-perceived model of man, which stood in the mirror of wisdom, and it drew the Ens (the principle) of all the qualities of the earth (matter) into a body, and this was the quintessence made out of the four elements." (Grace, v. 27.)

But the essence of the soul, being rooted in that whole, did not become manifest in man before God awakened it by the breath of His word. 1

"The sourcive spirits within the whole could not become immediately ignited by the soul, for the soul was only as a seed within the whole, hidden away with the heart of God in His heaven, until the Creator expanded the whole by His breath. Then the sourcive spirits ignited the soul, and then body and soul were living at once. The soul truly possessed her life before the body existed; but it was within the heart of God, hidden within the whole in heaven, and was nothing but a holy seed, a centre of power in God." (Aurora, xxvi. 126.)

Neither does at this present day the soul of man manifest divine life as long as the Spirit of God is only moving upon the surface and does not stir within the depths.

Footnotes
123:1 "Lucifer" is to be regarded not as a separate being within this world, but as a power penetrating the whole of the visible universe, in the same sense as that universe may now be regarded as being the body of universal spiritual man.

123:2 In other words, the tendency of the spiritual principle is to spiritualise and illumine everything by becoming active therein.

123:3 In the same sense the power of a seed to develop into a tree may remain latent for many years until the conditions present themselves for its manifestation.

123:4 Thus the fire of passion is subdued in man by the "water" of eternal life distilled from humility, which baptizes the soul and tranquillises the turbulent elements.

124:1 This goes to show the intimate relations existing between the spiritual and the material worlds. There is a "spiritual" and a "material" water, both of which are merely manifestations of the one element.

125:1 The same takes place within the heart of man when his mind becomes illumined by the light of divine wisdom that arises from the divine centre in him.

125:2 The seventh "day" for our planet is always and nevertheless it has not yet arrived, because the six days belong to time and the seventh to eternity.

126:1 The six "days" are the activities of the seven forms of eternal nature, the seventh is their centre or rest, or the "temperature." In the seventh, "God" appears as the "Christ." (See Grace, iii. 39.)

128:1 Three is the number of form, and therefore on the third "day," and by means of the third principle, three dimensional forms (there can be no other) came (and continue to come) into objective existence.

131:1 Man judges himself. According to his conscience will turn the scales of the balance. The judgment-day appears when the judging spirits awaken in him.

132:1 All the illumined philosophers of the past speak of only seven planets, and if we accept the possibility of spiritual perception and agree that this p. 133 perception was true, then there can be no more than seven original planets in our solar system, and the remaining two may be looked upon as excrescences, or shadows, as would also appear from the maleficent influence of at least one of these, which is known to astrologers.

134:1 For explicit details regarding the inhabitants of the elemental world see Paracelsus. The existence of such beings will become more comprehensible if we remember that the universe is an organised unity, and that each form therein, whether it is visible or invisible to us, is nothing but a relative expanse of manifestation of the consciousness that resides in the All.

135:1 All this refers not only to beings such as are visible to us, but likewise to such that exist on other planes of creation, and which can therefore not be seen with our eyes. There are male and female elemental beings, moll and dur accords in music, positive and negative forces in all departments of nature, from the spiritual down to the most material plane. In all creatures the will is the executing and female, corporifying, and the imagination the superintending, directing, male element.

135:2 In regard to the "stuff out of which man is made," Theophrastus Paracelsus says: "It is an extract of all beings that exist in heaven and upon the earth, of the souls of all things, all creatures, spirits, elements, and minds, attracted to a focus by means of the spiritual centre residing within each form. It is the quintessence of all things, and man is a microcosm, differing from the macrocosm only in so far as in his constitution the things which constitute the macrocosm appear in another image, order, or shape. In him are all the potencies and qualities that exist in the universe, active or latent. His terrestrial substance is from the earth, his mental faculties from the universal mind, his worldly wisdom is from the light of nature; but the divine wisdom in him belongs to God."

136:1 In studying the "anatomy" and "physiology" of the inner man, it will be necessary to remember that, in dealing with anthropology and cosmology from a spiritual point of view, we must be able to discard from our mind all the vulgar conceptions of what is usually called "matter " by that science which deals merely with external appearances, and we must look upon all things as being manifestations of an universal consciousness, acting upon internal or external planes of existence, while the visible form is nothing but a passing apparition.

137:1 Man is made out of will and imagination; in other words, "fire" and "light." The manifestation of fire and light (thought) produces that which appears to us as "substance" or "form."

137:2 It is not "man" in the abstract who recognises anything. It is always a certain principle, having become active in him, that recognises its own counterpart in external nature, when it comes in contact with it. Only he in whom is light can see the light; only the element of love can feel love; only the divinity in man can know God in and through man.

138:1 Therefore Theophrastus Paracelsus says: "Natural man is made out of the world, and not the world out of him. He is a child of nature, and has all of his mother's qualities in himself, neither more nor less. But the true spiritual man is a son of God. Natural wisdom is not divine, but divine wisdom is above all."

139:1 And thus at this very day each person who has not yet begun to be regenerated in the spirit is in the same condition in which Adam was before the Spirit of God breathed in him. Man's soul resembles a seed containing the potency of conscious immortality in an unconscious state. There is nothing immortal in man except God, and by the awakening of that which is divine in him attains the self-consciousness of his own immortality.