134. But now the Scripture saith, The devil was
a holy angel. And further, it saith, Thou art not
a God that willeth evil. And in Ezekiel, As sure
as I live, I will not the death of a sinner. This
is testified by God's earnest severe punishing of
the devils, and all sinners, that he is not pleased
with death.
35. What then moved the devil to be angry, and
evil ? What is the first matter [of it] in him, seeing
he was created out of the original eternal spirit?
Or from whence is the original of hell, wherein the
devils shall remain for ever, when this world, with
the stars, and elements, earth, and stones, shall
perish in the end ?
36. Beloved Reader, open the eyes of your mind
here, and know, that no other [anguish] source will
spring up in him [and torment him] than his own
1 Or working , , . - " .
property. quality ; tor that is his hell out of which he is
Ch. 4] OF THE TRUE ETERNAL NATURE 47
created and made ; and the light of God is his
eternal shame, and therefore he is God's enemy,
because he is no more in the light of God.
237. Now you can here produce nothing more,
that God should ever use any matter out of which
to create the devil, for then the devil might justify
himself, that he made him evil, or of evil matter.
For God created him out of nothing, but merely
out of his own essence or substance, as well as the
other angels. As it is written, Through him, and
in him, are all things : And his only is the kingdom, the power, and the glory ; and all in him, as
the holy Scripture witnesseth. And if it was not
thus, no sin would be * imputed to the devil, nor i or accountmen, if they were not eternal, and both in God, and e
out of God himself.
38. For to a beast (which is created out of
matter) no sin may be imputed, for its spirit
reacheth not the first Principle ; but it hath its
original in the third Principle, in the elementary
and sidereal kingdom, in the corruptibility, and it
reacheth not the Deity, as the devil and the soul
of man do.
39. And if you cannot believe this, take the
holy Scripture before you, which telleth you, that
when man was fallen into sin, God sent him his
own Heart, life, or light, out of himself into the
flesh, and opened the gate of the birth of his life,
wherein he was united with God ; and being broken
off in the light [part] (yet continued in the original
48 THE THREE PRINCIPLES [Ch. 4
of the first Principle) he hath kindled that light,
and so united himself to man again.
340. If the soul of a man were not (sprung) out
of God the Father out of his first Principle, but
out of another matter, he could not have bestowed
that highest earnest or pledge of his own heart and
light upon him, as himself witnessed, saying, / am
ike Light of the world, and the Life of man ; but
he could very well have redeemed or helped him
some other way.
41. But what do you think that he brought to
man into the flesh when he came ? Nothing else
but what Adam and our mother Eve had lost in
paradise ; the same did the Treader upon the
Serpent bring again to the monstrous birth, and
delivered man out of that elementary and sidereal
house of flesh, and set him again in paradise ; of
which I will write at large hereafter.
42. If therefore you will speak or think of God,
you must consider that he is all ; and you must
look further into the three Principles, wherein you
will find what God is, you will find what the
wrath, the devil, hell and sin are ; also, what the
angels, man and beasts are, and how the separation
or variation followed, from whence all things have
thus proceeded ; you will find the creation of the
world.
43. Only (Reader) I admonish you sincerely, if
you be not in the way of the prodigal, or lost son,
returning to his Father again, that you leave my
Ch. 4] OF THE TRUE ETERNAL NATURE 49
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.