The Divine Pymander of Hermes Mercurius Trismegistus

by Hermes Trismegistus

Hermes, for he was the first Intelligencer in the World (as we read of) that communicated Knowledge to the sons of Men, by Writing, or Engraving.

he was King of Egypt.

he was named Ter Maximus: for being preferred [Franciscus Flussas] (according to the Egyptian Customs) being chief Philosopher, to be chief of the Priesthood: and from thence, to be chief in Government, or King.

he was called Ter Maximus; for having perfect, and exact Knowledge of all things contained in the World; which things he divided into Three Kingdoms (as he calls them), viz., Mineral, Vegetable, Animal;

it is received amongst the Ancients, that he was the first that invented the Art of communicating Knowledge to the World, by Writing or Engraving. Now if so, then in all probability he was before Moses;

attained to the good. It is a venerable way and plain, but hard and difficult for the soul to go in that is in the body.

thou must first forsake the Body before thy end, and get the victory in this contention and strifeful life, and when thou hast overcome, return.

That which may be dissolved is also corruptible.

Everything that suffers is sensible; everything that is sensible, suffereth.

Operation or Workings are not carried upwards, but descend downwards.

The Earth is brutish; the Heaven is reasonable or rational.

What is God? The immutable or unalterable good.

They do rather sharpen and whet evil men to their maliciousness; therefore, it behoveth to avoid the multitude, and take heed of them as not understanding the virtue and power of the things that are said.

conceive well the Light in they mind, and know it.

For the Mind being God, Male and Female, Life and Light, brought forth by his Word another Mind or Workman; which being God of the Fire, and the Spirit,

And man was made of Life and Light, into Soul and Mind; of Life the soul, of Light the Mind.

God and the Father is Light and Life, of which Man is made. If therefore thou learn and believe thyself to be of the Life and Light, thou shalt again pass into Life.

The Mind is in Reason, Reason in the Soul, The Soul in the Spirit, The Spirit in the Body.

There are therefore, these three, God the Father, and the Good, the World, and Man. God hath the World, and the World hath Man; and the World is the Son of God, and Man as it were the offspring of the World.

the Mind compacted, as it were, and took to itself the passable Body of the Soul, as a covering or clothing. And the Soul being also in some sort Divine, useth the Spirit as her Minister or Servant; and the Spirit governeth the living things.

For the Mind, when it is ordered or appointed to get a Fiery Body for the services of God, coming down into the wicked soul, torments it with the whips of Sins, wherewith the wicked Soul, being scorged, turns itself to Murders and Contumelies, and Blasphemies, and divers violences, and other things by which men are injured.

But into a pious soul, the mind entering, leads it into the Light of Knowledge.

Thou, therefore, O Tat, my Son, pray first to the Lord and Father, and to the Alone, and to the One, from whom is one to be merciful to thee, that thou mayest know and understand so great a God; and that he would shine one of his beams upon thee in thy understanding.

Important

For only the Understanding see that which is not manifest, or apparent, as being itself not manifest or apparent; and if thou canst, O Tat, it will appear to the eyes of thy Mind.

Important

Herm. I would, O Son, that thou also wert gone out of thyself, like them that Dream in their sleep.

Herm. One Torment, Son, is Ignorance: a second, Sorrow; a third, Intemperance; a fourth, Concupiscence; a fifth, Injustice; a sixth, Covetousness; a seventh, Deceit; an eighth,Envy; a ninth, Fraud or Guile; a tenth, Wrath; an eleventh, Rashness; a twelfth, Maliciousness.

See, O Son, how the Good is fulfilled by the access of Truth; for by this means Envy is gone from us; for Truth is accompanied with the Good, together also with Life and Light.

And learn this from me: Above all other Virtues entertain Silence, and impart unto no man, O Son, the tradition of Regeneration, lest we be reputed Calumniators; for we both have now sufficiently meditated, I in speaking, thou in hearing. And now thou dost intellectually know thyself and our Father.

Important

But first thou must tear to pieces, and break through the garment thou wearest, the web of Ignorance; the foundation of all Mischief; the bond of Corruption; the dark Coverture; the living Death; the sensible Carcass; the Sepulchre, carried about with us; the domestical Thief, which in what he loves us, hates us, envies us.

Therefore, those things thou callest empty, thou oughtest to call them hollow, not empty; for they exist and are full of Air and Spirit.

God is in the Mind, the Mind in the Soul, the Soul in the Matter, all things by Eternity.

All this Universal Body, in which are all Bodies, is full of Soul, the Soul full of Mind, the Mind full of God.

For all living Bodies have a Soul; and those things that are not living, are only matter by itself.

Life is the union of the Mind and the Soul. 102. But death is not the destruction of those things that were gathered together, but a dissolving of the Union.

And judge of this by thyself, command thy Soul to go into India, and sooner than thou canst bid it, it will be there. 121. Bid it likewise pass over the Ocean, and suddenly it will be there; not as passing from place to place, but suddenly it will be there.

After this manner, therefore, contemplate God to have all the whole world to himself, as it were, all thoughts, or intellections. 126. If therefore thou wilt not equal thyself to God, thou canst not understand God.

Become higher than all height, lower than all depths, comprehend in thyself the qualitites of all the Creatures, of the Fire, the Water, the Dry, and Moist, and conceive likewise, that thou canst at once be everywhere, in the Sea, in the Earth.

Thou shalt at once understand thyself, not yet begotten in the Womb, young, old, to be dead, the things after death, and all these together, as also times, places, deeds, qualities, quantities, or else thou canst not yet understand God.

For there is nothing which is not the Image of God.

This is the Good of God, this is the Virtue, to appear, and to be seen in all things.

And of man, thou must understand, some to be rational, or governed by reason, and some irrational. 31. But all men are subject to Fate, and to Generation, and Change, for these are the beginning and end of Fate or Destiny

First, if, O Son, thou shalt diligently withdraw thyself from all contentious speeches, thou shalt find that in Truth, the Mind, the Soul of God bears rule over all things, both over Fate, and Law, and all other things.

Everything that moveth is incorporeal; everything that is moved is a Body; and it is moved into the Bodies by the Mind. Now, Motion is passion, and there they both suffer; as well that which moveth, as that which is moved, as well that which ruleth, as that which is ruled.

Wow

For Generation is not a Creation of Life, but a production of things to Sense, and making them manifest. Neither is Change Death, but an Occultation of hiding of that which was.

Yes

The things most apparent are Evil, but the Good is secret, or hid in, or to the things that appear, for it hath neither Form nor Figure.

For Divinity is… from under God, and Understanding from the Mind, being the Sister of the Word or Speech, and they the Instruments one of another. 7. For neither is the Word pronounced without Understanding, neither is Understanding manifested without the Word.

And therefore they that have that knowledge, neither please the multitude, nor the multitude them, but they seem to be mad, and to move laughter, hated and despised, and many times also murdered.

Wow

For all things that are, O Asclepius, are in God, and made by him, and depend of him, some working by bodies, some moving by a Soul, like Essence, some quickening by a Spirit, and some receiving the things that are weary, and all very fitly.

But as far as it is possible and just (I say). That Truth is only in Eternal Bodies, whose very Bodies are also True.

All things, therefore, upon Earth, O Tat, are not Truth, but imitations of the Truth, and yet not all things neither, for they are but few that are so.