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(p. 119) 5. FRAGMENTS OF
THE BOOK OF HERMES TO HIS SON TATIOS
PART I
Trismegistos: IT is for
the love of men and for the veneration of God, O my son, that
I begin to write this. For there is no other true religion than to meditate on
the universe and give thanks to the (p. 120) Creator;
and these things I shall not cease to do. Tatios: O father, if
nothing here below be real, how can one wisely employ
one's life? Trismegistos: Be
religious, my son; religion is lofty philosophy; without philosophy there is no
lofty religion. He who instructs himself concerning
the universe, its law, its principle, and its end, gives thanks for all things
to the Creator as to a gracious father, a good protector, a faithful teacher.
This is religion, and by means of it we know where truth is and what it is.
Knowledge increases religion. For when once the soul, imprisoned within the
body, has lifted herself to the perception of the real
Good and of Truth, she cannot again fall back. The might of Love, and the
oblivion of all evil things, forbid the soul who knows her Maker to separate
herself from the Good. Herein, my son, is the aim of religion; if thou canst
attain thereunto, thy life will be pure, thy death happy; thy soul will know
whither she ought to direct her flight. Herein is the only way which leads to
Truth, which, indeed, our ancestors trod, and by which they arrived at the
attainment of the Good. This way is beautiful and even; nevertheless, it is
difficult for the soul to walk therein so long as she is immured within the
prison of the body. For, first, she must contend against herself, and having
accomplished a division of herself, (p. 121) she must submit to that part of herself which is first in
dignity. For the one struggles against the two,
that would fain rise, but these would drag it downwards. (1) Nor is
victory the same to both sides; for the one
tends towards the Good, and the two
towards Evil; the one would
be free, the two cling
to servitude. If the two be
overcome, there remains a bulwark of defence for them
and for their master; but if the one
be the weaker, it is drawn away by the two,
and punished in this life here below. It is this one, my son, which ought to be thy guide. See that
thou anoint thyself with oil for the struggle, maintain the fight for life, and
remain victorious. And now, my son, I am about to sum up our principles; thou wilt
understand my words by remembering that which thou hast learnt. All beings are endowed with motion; non-being alone is motionless. All
bodies transform themselves; some only decompose. All creatures are not mortal;
nor are all immortal. That which is dissoluble is corruptible; that which is
permanent is immutable: that which is immutable is eternal; that which is
continually generated is continually corrupted, but that which is born but once
is not corrupted and is not changed into any other thing. First
God, then the Universe, and thirdly Man; the Universe for Man, and Man for God.
The emotional part of the Soul is mortal; her rational part is immortal; all
substance is immortal, all substance is subjected to change. All being is dual;
no being is (p. 122) permanent. All things are not animated by soul, but
all that is being is animated by soul. All that is passive is sentient; all
that is sentient is transient. Everything that suffers and enjoys is a mortal
creature; all that enjoys and suffers not is a being immortal. Not every body
is subject to disease, but every body so subject is destructible. In God is
Intelligence; in Man is Reason. Reason is in Intelligence, Intelligence is
intransient. There is nothing real in the corporeal; nothing false in the
incorporeal. Everything that is born changes, but not everything born corrupts.
There is nothing perfect upon earth, nor anything evil
in heaven. God is perfect; man is evil. The good comes by will; evil against
will. The Gods chose the good as good. Time is divine; law is human. Evil is
the pabulum of the world; Time is the destruction of man. All things in heaven
are immutable; nothing is immutable on earth. In heaven, then, is no servitude;
on earth there is no freedom. Nothing in heaven is unknown; on earth nothing is
known. There is nothing in common between celestial things and things
terrestrial. All is irreproachable in heaven; on earth nothing is without
reproach. The immortal knows no mortality; nor does the mortal know
immortality. That which is sown does not always come up; but that which comes
up has always been sown. Corruptible bodies have two periods of existence: from
conception to birth, and from birth to death; but the eternal entity has one
period only from the moment of being. Dissoluble bodies increase and diminish.
Dissoluble matter divides itself according to two contrary terms –
destruction and birth; immortal substance divides itself either into itself or
into its similars. The birth of man is a destruction;
the destruction of man is an (p. 123) element of birth. That which ends begins; that
which begins ends. Among beings, some are in bodies, some in forms, some in energies. The body is in forms; form and energy are
in bodies. The immortal receives nothing from the mortal; but the mortal
receives from the immortal. The mortal enters not into an immortal form; but
the immortal enters into a mortal body. Energies tend not upward, but downward.
That which is on earth profits not that which is in heaven; but all that is in
heaven profits that which is on earth. Heaven contains immortal entities; earth
contains perishable bodies. Earth is irrational; heaven is reasonable.
Celestial things are under the power of heaven; terrestrial things are upon
earth. Heaven is the primordial element. Divine providence is order; necessity
is the, instrument with which providence works. Fortuity is the vehicle of
disorder, the false image of energy, a delusive seeming. What is God but
immutable Good, or man but continual evil? In remembering these principles, thou wilt easily recollect the things I
have explained to thee more at length, and which are therein resumed. But avoid
speaking of them to the multitude; not that I desire to prohibit the multitude
from knowing these things, but that I would not have thee exposed to the
mockeries of the vulgar. Like attracts like; but between dissimilars
there is no fellowship. These discourses ought to have but a small number of auditors, else before long they wilt have none at all. There
is, moreover, a special peril attaching to them, for by means of them the
wicked may be instigated to do worse. Keep thyself, therefore, from the crowd, which
cannot understand the virtue of these discourses. (p. 124) Tatios: What
meanest thou, my father? Trismegistos: Hearken, my son.
The human race is drawn towards evil. Evil is its nature, and pleases it. If men
should learn that the world is created, that all is done according to
providence and necessity, and that by necessity and destiny all things are
governed, they would readily begin to despise all things because they are
created; to attribute vice to destiny, and to give the rein to all manner of
iniquity. Therefore, abstain from the crowd, so that by means of ignorance the
vulgar may be kept within bounds, even through fear of the unknown.
FOOTNOTES (121:1) With
Plato, says Dr. Ménard, Trismegistos
here opposes Intelligence, the first
part of the Soul, to the two other parts, Passion and Desire. A. K.
PART
II Tatios: THOU hast well explained to me
these things, my father, but instruct me yet again concerning this. Thou hast
told me that knowledge and art are activities of the reason; and now thou sayest that brute animals are so called because they have
no reason. Whence it must necessarily follow that they have
neither knowledge nor art. (p. 125) Trismegistos: It
necessarily so follows, my son. Tatios: How
then is it, father, that we behold certain animals making use of scientific and
constructive knowledge; as, for instance, the ants who store up provisions for
the winter, the birds who devise nests, the cattle who
know their stables and return thither? Trismegistos: It is neither
science nor art that directs them, my son, but nature. Science and art are
acquired, but these creatures have acquired nothing. That which is naturally
performed is the product of the universal activity; science and art belong only
to those who have acquired them. Functions which are the common heritage are
natural functions. Thus, all men can make use of their eyes, but not all are
musicians, archers, hunters, and so forth. Some only among the many learn a
science or an art, and exercise it. If in like manner certain ants only did
what other ants do not, then thou mightest say with
reason that they possess the science or the art of storing provisions. But all
act in the same way under the impulsion of Nature and without deliberate
intent; whence it is evident that neither science nor art directs them. Activities, O Tatios, are incorporeal, and are
exercised in the body and by the body. Insomuch as they are incorporeal, thou mayest indeed call them immortal; (p. 126) insomuch as they cannot be exercised but by means
of a body, I say that they are always in a body. That of which the end and
cause are determined by providence and necessity cannot remain inactive. That
which is shall still be, therein is its body and its
life. For which reason there will always be bodies; wherefore the creation of
bodies is an eternal function. For terrestrial bodies are corruptible;
nevertheless, bodies are necessary as abodes and as instruments for the
energies. Now, the energies are immortal, and that which is immortal is always
active. The creation of bodies is, then, a function, and an eternal function. The energies or faculties of the soul are not all at once manifest;
certain of them are manifest from the time of the birth of man, in the non-rational
part of his soul; and as the reasonable part develops itself with age, the
loftier faculties also lend their assistance. The faculties are attached to
bodies. They descend from divine forms into mortal forms, and by them bodies
are created. Each of the faculties exercises a function either of the body or
of the soul, but they subsist in the soul independently of the body. For the
energies are eternal, but the soul is not always imprisoned in a mortal body.
She can live without it, yet the faculties cannot manifest themselves unless in
a body. This, my son, is an arcane discourse. The body cannot remain without
the soul, but being can. Tatios: What
meanest thou, my father? Trismegistos: Understand
me, O Tatios. When the soul is separated (p. 127) from the body, the body indeed remains, but it is
undermined by interior dissolution, and ends by disintegrating. Such an effect
cannot be produced without an active cause; therefore, there remains some
energy in the body after the withdrawal of the soul. Between an immortal entity
and a mortal entity there is this difference: that the first is formed of
simple substance, but not so the second. One is active, the other passive. All
active being dominates, all passive being obeys; one is free, and governs; the
other is in servitude, and subject to impulsion. Now, the energies are not only in animate bodies, but in inanimate, such
as wood, stone, and other like things. By means of the energies these things
increase, fructify, ripen, decompose, dissolve, putrefy, disintegrate, and
undergo all those changes of which inanimate bodies are susceptible. For energy
is that which produces change, or becoming.
And becoming is multiple, or rather universal. Never will anything capable
of birth be wanting to the universe, because beings are continually brought
forth by it and continually destroyed. All energy is then indestructible, no
matter of what nature or in what body it is manifest. But among the energies,
some are exerted in divine entities, some in mortal entities; some are
universal, others special; some act upon species, others on individuals
pertaining to these. Divine energies are exerted in eternal entities, and are
perfect as these. Partial energies act by means of living beings; special
energies in everything which exists. Whence it results, my
son, that the whole universe is full of energies. For since energies
necessarily manifest in bodies, there are many bodies in the universe.
Nevertheless, the energies are more numerous (p. 128) than the bodies, for often there exist one, two, three
energies in a body, without counting those which are universally distributed. I
call those universal energies which are inseparable from bodies and which
manifest themselves by sensations and movements, and without which no body
could exist. Far otherwise are those special energies which manifest themselves
in human minds by art, science, and labour. The
sensations accompany the energies, or rather are; the consequence of these
last. Understand, O my son, the difference there is
between the energies and the sensations. Energy comes from above; sensation is
of the body, and from the body has its being. It is the seat of the energy,
which manifests by means of it, and from which it obtains, as it were, a
vehicle. For this reason I say that sensations are corporeal and mortal; their
existence is bound up with that of the body, they are born therewith, and
therewith they die. Immortal energies have not sensation, precisely because of
the nature of their essence; for there can be no other sensation than that of
some good or some evil which happens to a body or which departs therefrom, and immortal entities are not subject to these
accidents. Tatios: Sensation,
then, is experienced by all bodies? Trismegistos: Yes, my
son, and in all bodies the energies act. Tatios: Even in
inanimate bodies, my father? (p. 129) Trismegistos: Even in inanimate
bodies. Sensations are of different kinds; those of reasonable beings are accompanied
by reason; those of beings without reason are purely corporeal; those of
inanimate beings are passive, and consist only in growth and decay. Starting
from one principle and arriving at one end, passion and sensation are alike the
product of the energies. In animate beings, there are two other energies which
accompany the passions and the sensations – to wit, joy and sorrow.
Without these, the animated being, and, above all, the reasonable being, would
feel nothing: they may then be considered as modes of the affections in
reasonable beings, or indeed in all living beings. They are activities
manifested by the sensations, corporeal movements produced by the irrational
parts of the soul. Joy and sorrow are alike evil; for joy – that is, the
sensation accompanied by pleasure – draws after it great evils; sorrow,
likewise, involves penalties and suffering, yet more severe. Both joy and
sorrow, then, are evil. Tatios: Is sensation the same thing in the soul and in the body,
my father? Trismegistos: What meanest thou,
my child, by the sensation of the soul? Tatios: The soul is truly
incorporeal. But sensation is as a body, my father, for it exists in a body. (p. 130) Trismegistos: If we place it in
the body, my son, we indeed assimilate it either to the soul or to the
energies, which, although in the body, are incorporeal. But sensation is
neither an energy nor a soul, nor anything distinct
from the body; it is not, therefore, incorporeal. If it be not incorporeal, it
must necessarily be corporeal, for there is nothing which is neither corporeal
nor incorporeal.
PART III THE Lord, the Creator
of immortal forms, O Tatios, after having
accomplished His work, made nothing further, nor does He now make anything.
Once consigned to themselves and united to one
another, these eternal forms move without having need of anything, or if,
indeed, they are necessary one to another, they have at least no need of any
extraneous impulsion, since they are immortal. Such ought, indeed, to be the
nature of the creations of the supreme God. But our (immediate) maker has a
body; he has brought us forth, and unceasingly he brings forth, and will bring
forth dissoluble and mortal bodies, for he ought not to imitate his own
Creator, and, moreover, he cannot. For the first has evolved His (p. 131) creations from His own essence, primordial and
incorporeal; the second has formed us of that which is corporeal and
engendered. Whence it follows naturally, that heavenly forms born of
incorporeal essence are imperishable, while our bodies, being constituted of
corporeal matter, are consequently weak in themselves,
and need extraneous assistance. For how, indeed, could the combination which composes our bodies be sustained,
if it were not continually fed and supported by elements of the same nature?
The earth, the water, the fire, and the air flow into us and renew our
covering. We are so weak that we cannot even endure a single day of movement.
Thou knowest well, my son, that without the repose of
the night our bodies would not resist the day's toil. For this reason our good
creator, in his universal providence, has ensured the continual life of
his creatures by devising sleep, the restorer of movement, and by assigning to
repose an equal or even longer time (than to labour).
Meditate, my son, on this virtue of sleep, opposed to that of the soul, and not
less energetic. For if the function of the soul be movement, bodies cannot live
without slumber, which loosens and unbinds the yoke of the organism, and by its
restoring action dispenses to it the matter which it needs, giving water to the
blood, earth to the bones, air to the nerves and vessels, fire to the eyes. And
hence the great pleasure which the body finds in sleep. [Note – The opening passage of this fragmentary discourse will not
lead the reader into error if he bears in mind the pantheistic character of all
Hermetic teaching. The influx of the divine substance into the universe is
perpetual, but the channels or forms through which (p. 132) it flows are immutable, unchangeable, and
self-sustaining. The method of nature is determined from the beginning, and is
incapable of variation or of intermittance. But the
descent of soul into generation is a continual process, and will not cease
until the creative period or "Day of Manifestation" closes. There has
never been any suspension of the divine energies since the commencement of
their primordial operation. The outflow of Being into Existence is unending,
otherwise natural generation would cease, and evolution be arrested. The
secondary creator mentioned in this fragment is the Demiourgos,
the fabricator of the material universe. A. K.]
PART IV A GREAT and divine power
is established, O my son, in the midst of the universe, beholding all that is
done by men upon earth. In the divine order all is governed by providential
Necessity; among men the same function belongs to Justice. The first of these
governments includes celestial things, for the Gods neither will, nor can,
transgress; not being subject to error, which is the source of sin, they are
sinless. The second, Justice, is charged to correct, upon earth, the evil which
happens among men. The human race, being mortal, and formed of corruptible
matter, is subject to fall away when the sight of divine things does not
sustain it (in virtue). Herein Justice exerts its action. By means of the
energies which he draws from Nature, man is subject to Destiny; by the errors
of his life, to Justice.
(p. 133) PART V HERE, then, is that
which can be said of the
three tenses. They are not by themselves, and they are not bound together;
again, they are bound together and are by themselves. Can the present be supposed
without the existence of the past? One cannot exist without another, for the
present is generated by the past, and from the present the future comes forth.
If we wish to go to the root of the matter, we must reason thus: – The
past tense is withdrawn into that which no longer is; the future is not so long
as it has not become present; the present, in its turn, ceases to be itself the
instant that it remains. Can that which does not endure for
an instant and which has no fixed centre be called present when it cannot even
be said to exist? Moreover, since the past is indistinguishable from the
present, and the present from the future, they become one. There is among them
identity, unity, continuity. Therefore time is continuous and divisible, even
while it is one and identical.
PART
VI O MY son, matter
becomes; formerly it was, for matter is the vehicle of becoming. (1)
Becoming is the mode of activity of the uncreate
and foreseeing God. Having been (p.134) endowed with the germ of becoming, matter is
brought into birth, for the creative force fashions it according to the ideal
forms. Matter not yet engendered, had no form; it becomes when it is put into
operation. FOOTNOTES (133:1) Dr. Ménard observes that in Greek, the same word
signifies to be born and to
become. The idea here is that
the material of the world is in its essence eternal, but that before creation
or "becoming," it is in a passive and motionless condition. Thus it
"was" before being "put into operation;" now, it "becomes,"
that is, it is mobile and progressive. Creation is thus the period of activity
of God, who, according to Hermetic thought, has two modes – Activity, or
existence, God evolved (Deus explicitus); and
Passivity of Being – God involved (Deus implicitus).
Both modes are perfect and complete, as are the waking and sleeping states of
man. Fichte, the German philosopher, distinguished
Being (Seyn) as One, which we know only through
existence (Daseyn) as the Manifold. This view is
thoroughly Hermetic. The "Ideal Forms," mentioned in the above
fragment, are the archetypal or formative ideas of the Neo-Platonists; the
eternal and subjective concepts of things subsisting in the Divine Mind prior
to "creation” or "becoming." A. K.
PART
VII TO speak of the Real
with certainty, O Tatios, is an impossible thing to man, himself an imperfect
creature, composed of imperfect parts, and constituted of an assemblage of
foreign particles; nevertheless, as much as it is possible and permissible to
me, I affirm that Reality is only in eternal beings, the forms of which also
are real. Fire is but fire and no more; earth is nothing else than earth; air (p. 135) is only air. But our bodies are compounded of all these;
we have in us fire, earth, water, and air, which yet are neither fire, nor
earth, nor water, nor air, nor anything truly. If, then, from the beginning
Reality is foreign to our constitution, how shall we behold Reality, or speak
thereof, or even understand it, unless indeed by the Will of God? Mundane
things, O Tatios, are not then themselves real, but
the simulacra of Reality, and not all are even such; some are but illusion and
error, O Tatios, fantastic appearances, mere
phantoms. When such an appearance receives an influx from above, then, indeed,
it becomes a similitude of the Real, but without this superior influence it
remains an illusion. In the same way a portrait is a painted image of a body,
but not the body it represents. It appears to have eyes, but sees nothing;
ears, but hears nothing; and so on of the rest of it. It is an image which
deceives the sight; it appears a reality, and is but a shadow. Those who behold
not the False behold the True; if, then, we understand and see everything as it
truly is, we see the Real; but if we see that which is not, we can neither
understand nor know anything of the Real. Tatios: There
is, then, my father, a Real even upon earth? Trismegistos:
Reality is not upon the earth, my son, and it cannot be thereon, but it can be
comprehended by a few men to whom God vouchsafes the divine vision. Nothing on
earth is real, there are only appearances and opinions
on (p. 136) earth; yet all is real for intelligence and reason.
Wherefore to think and to speak the truth this indeed may be called real. Tatios: What sayest thou? It is right to think and speak that which
truly is, and yet nothing is true upon earth? Trismegistos: This
certainly is true, that we know nothing of Truth. How should it be otherwise,
my son? Truth is the supreme virtue, the sovereign Good which is not obscured by
matter, nor circumscribed by the body; the naked Good, evident, unalterable,
august, immutable. Now, the things which are here below thou seest, my son, are incompatible with the Good; they are
perishable, changing, various, passing from form to form. That which is not
even identical with itself, how can it be real? All that transforms itself is
illusive, not only in itself, but by the appearances which it presents to us
one after another. Tatios: Is not even man real, my father? Trismegistos: He is not real, my
son, as man. The real consists solely in itself, and remains what it is. Man is
composed of manifold elements, and does not continue identical (p. 137) with himself. So
long as he inhabits a body he passes from one age to another, and from one form to another. Often, after but a
short interval of time, parents no longer are able to recognize their children,
nor children their parents. That which changes in such wise as to be no longer
recognizable as itself, can it be a real thing, Tatios? Should we not rather think this succession of
diverse appearances an illusion? Look only on the
eternal and the Good as the Real. Man is transient, therefore he is not real;
he is but appearance, and appearance is the supreme illusion. Tatios: Then the celestial bodies themselves are
not real, my father, since they also vary. Trismegistos: That
which is subject to birth and to change is not real, but the works of the great
Father may receive from Him a real substance. Nevertheless, there is in them a
certain falsity, seeing that they too are variable, for nothing is real save
that which is identical with itself. Tatios: What, then, may we
call indeed real, my father? Trismegistos: The sun, the only one
of all creatures that changes not, and which remains the same. For this reason
is confided to him alone the ordinance of the universe; he (p.138) is the chief and the maker of everything; I venerate him
and prostrate myself before his truth, and after the first Unity, I recognize
in him the creator. Tatios: And
what, then, is the primordial Reality, O my father? Trismegistos: He Who is One and alone, O Tatios; He
Who is not made of matter, nor in any body, Who has neither colour
nor form, Who changes not, nor is transmuted, but who always Is. *
*
*
*
*
*
* That which is illusion is perishable, my son. The
providence of the Real has limited and will limit by dissolution all mundane
things, for dissolution is the condition of all births; all that is brought
forth dissolves in order to be again brought forth. It is necessary that out of
dissolution life should come into existence, and that life in its turn should
decay, in order that the generation of creatures should never cease. Behold,
then, in this perpetual birth, the Creator before all! Creatures born of
dissolution are but shadows, they become at one time this, at another that; for
they cannot be the same, and how is it possible for that which is not identical
with itself, to be a real thing? Such must then, my son, be called appearances,
and man must be regarded as an appearance of Humanity; as, also, a child is an
appearance of childhood, a young man of adolescence, an adult of manhood, an
old man of (p. 139) senility. For how shall it be said that a man is a
man, a child a child, a youth a youth, a grown man a grown man, an old man an
old man, since by incessant transformations they deceive us both as to what
they were, and what they have become? Behold, then, in all these things, my
son, only the illusive appearances of a superior Reality; and since, indeed,
this is the case, I define Illusion as the expression of the Real.
PART VIII
TO understand God is
difficult; to speak of God, impossible. For the corporeal cannot express the
incorporeal; the imperfect cannot comprehend the perfect. How is the eternal to
be associated with the transient? The first abides for ever, the other is
fleeting; the first is the Real, the other is a reflected shadow. As much as
weakness differs from strength, or smallness from greatness, so much the mortal
differs from the divine. The distance which divides them one from the other
obscures the vision of the beautiful. Bodies are visible to sight, and that
which the eye beholds the tongue is able to express. But that which has not any
body, nor appearance, nor form, nor matter, cannot be apprehended by sense. (p. 140) I understand, O Tatios, I understand that
which it is impossible to define – that is God.
[The
above fragments are from the "Physical Eclogues" and “Florilegium" of Stobaeus.]
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