1that you can hear that which stirreth and maketh
a noise ? Wilt thou say that it is caused by the
noise of that outward thing which giveth the
sound ? No ! there must also be somewhat that
must receive the sound, and qualify or mix with
the sound, and distinguish the sound of what is
played or sung ; the outward cannot do that alone,
the inward must receive and distinguish the noise.
Behold, here you find the beginning of the life,
and the tincture wherein the life consisteth ; for
the tincture of the crack in the springing up of
the life, in the breaking-open of the dark gate,
standeth in the sounding, and hath its gate open
(next the fire-flash near the eyes) and receiveth
the noise of whatsoever soundeth.
68. For the outward sounding qualifieth with
the inward, and is severed [or distinguished] by the
essences ; and the tincture receiveth all, be it evil
or good, and thereby testifieth that itself, with its
essences that generate it, is not generated out of
the Deity, else the tincture would not let in the
evil, and [that which is] false into the essences of
the soul.
69. Therefore we must consider, that the noise
in the tincture of man is [of a] higher [nature]
than [that] in the beasts ; for man searcheth and
distinguisheth all things which give a sound, and
knoweth from whence it cometh, and how it doth
exist, which the beasts cannot do, but stare at it,
and know not what it is ; whereby it may be
Ch. 15] KNOWLEDGE OF THE ETERNITY 337
2understood, that the original of man is out of the
eternal, because he can distinguish all things that
in the out-birth came out of the eternal. And
hence it is, that the body (being all things out of
the eternal nothing are caused to be something
which is comprehensible [or palpable], and yet
there, that nothing is not a mere nothing, but it is
a l source) after the corrupting shall stand in the > Or active
eternal figure, and not in the spirit, because it is property>
not out of the eternal spirit ; for otherwise, if it
were out of the [eternal] spirit, then it should
also search out the beginning of every thing, as
[well as] man, who in his sound receiveth and
distinguisheth all things.
370. Thus now the habitation of man's sound,
wherein the understanding is, must be from eternity,
although indeed, in the fall of Adam, man hath set
himself in the corruptibility, and in great want
of understanding, as shall follow here. In like
manner also we find concerning the smelling ; for
if the spirit did not stand in the sound, then no
smell of any thing would press [or pierce] into the
essences ; for the spirit would be whole and swelled.
But it standing thus in the gate of the 2 broken » disrupted,
darkness in the crack and in the sound, therefore all virtues of all things press in into that gate,
and try themselves by one another, and what the
essences of the spirit love, that it desireth, and
draweth the same into the tincture ; and then hands
and mouth fall to it, and stuff it into the stomach,
22
338
THE THREE PRINCIPLES
[Ch. 15
Or atrium, into the 1 outward court of the four elements, from
whence the earthly essences of the stars and
elements feed.
The source text as printed, transcribed diplomatically. Where the source language uses a non-Latin script that reaches us only through a Victorian romanisation, this layer is labelled transliteration, because that is what we hold.