37. Whence Adam's imagination and earnest hunger did arise, that he would eat of the evil and good, and live in [his] own will. That is, his will departed out of the equal concord into the multiplicity of the properties; for he would prove, feel, taste, hear, smell and see them. As the devil did persuade them also in the Serpent, they should be as God, and their eyes should be open in the properties; which also happened unto them in the fall, that they knew, tasted, saw and felt evil and good: whence arose unto them sickness, disease, pains and corruption [or the dissolution of this carcass].
38. And seeing the divine providence did afore know that the devil would tempt man, and bring him into strange lust; lest he should long after the centre of the dark world, and become a devil, as Lucifer did, God did represent unto him the Tree of Life, and of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, wherein the dissolution of the outward life was manifest.
39. for Adam was guilty therein, seeing he was yet in Paradise when he lusted after vanity, and brought his imagination into the earth, viz. into that essence whence the limus of the outward body was extracted; and desired out of his mother to assay of the enkindled vanity which the devil had inflamed. Thereupon the Fiat drew him forth such a plant out of the matrix of the earth, whence also it had extracted Adam's body, so that Adam, in his hunger, had to eat.
40. For the essence in the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, and the hunger of the desire in Adam, were alike; what he desired was represented unto him by the Fiat; Adam's imagination was the cause of it.
41. Reason says, wherefore did God suffer it to come to pass? Christ said, If you had faith as a grain of mustard- seed, and should say to this mountain be cast into the sea, it should be done: [I prithee], was not the soul's spirit [sprung forth] out of the great divine omnipotence out of the centre of the eternal spiritual nature, whence all beings were created, and should it not then be potent?
42. He was a fire-spark out of God's might. But when he was formed into a creatural being of the creatures, he withdrew into selflust, and broke himself off from the universal being, and entered into a self-fullness. And so he wrought his own destruction, and this he had had, if God's love had not redeemed him.
43. The soul's power was so potent before the vanity, that it was not subject to any thing; and so it is still powerful, if the understanding were not taken away from it. It can by magic alter all things whatsoever that are in the outward world's essence, and introduce them into another essence; but the vanity in the outward air's dominion has brought a darkness thereinto, so that the soul does not know itself. The curse of God has cast the defiled child into the dirt, that it must pray for a laver; and must be in this lifetime its own enemy, that it may learn to be humble, and continue in the divine harmony, and not become a devil.
The Eighteenth Chapter
Of the Paradisical State * showing how it should have been if Adam had not fallen
* Dominion, life or condition
1. I KNOW the sophist will here cavil at me, and cry it down as a thing impossible for me to know, seeing I was not there and saw it myself: To him I say, that I, in the essence of my soul and body, when I was not as yet I, but when I was in Adam's essence, was there, and did myself fool away [negligently lose] my glory in Adam. But seeing Christ has restored it again unto me, I see, in the spirit of Christ, what I was in Paradise; and what I now am in sin; and what I shall be again.
And therefore let none cry it out as a thing unknowable; for although I indeed know it not, yet the spirit of Christ knows it in me; from which knowledge I shall write.
37. Whence Adam's imagination and earnest hunger did arise, that he would eat of the evil and good, and live in [his] own will. That is, his will departed out of the equal concord into the multiplicity of the properties; for he would prove, feel, taste, hear, smell and see them. As the devil did persuade them also in the Serpent, they should be as God, and their eyes should be open in the properties; which also happened unto them in the fall, that they knew, tasted, saw and felt evil and good: whence arose unto them sickness, disease, pains and corruption [or the dissolution of this carcass].
38. And seeing the divine providence did afore know that the devil would tempt man, and bring him into strange lust; lest he should long after the centre of the dark world, and become a devil, as Lucifer did, God did represent unto him the Tree of Life, and of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, wherein the dissolution of the outward life was manifest.
39. for Adam was guilty therein, seeing he was yet in Paradise when he lusted after vanity, and brought his imagination into the earth, viz. into that essence whence the limus of the outward body was extracted; and desired out of his mother to assay of the enkindled vanity which the devil had inflamed. Thereupon the Fiat drew him forth such a plant out of the matrix of the earth, whence also it had extracted Adam's body, so that Adam, in his hunger, had to eat.
40. For the essence in the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, and the hunger of the desire in Adam, were alike; what he desired was represented unto him by the Fiat; Adam's imagination was the cause of it.
41. Reason says, wherefore did God suffer it to come to pass? Christ said, If you had faith as a grain of mustard- seed, and should say to this mountain be cast into the sea, it should be done: [I prithee], was not the soul's spirit [sprung forth] out of the great divine omnipotence out of the centre of the eternal spiritual nature, whence all beings were created, and should it not then be potent?
42. He was a fire-spark out of God's might. But when he was formed into a creatural being of the creatures, he withdrew into selflust, and broke himself off from the universal being, and entered into a self-fullness. And so he wrought his own destruction, and this he had had, if God's love had not redeemed him.
43. The soul's power was so potent before the vanity, that it was not subject to any thing; and so it is still powerful, if the understanding were not taken away from it. It can by magic alter all things whatsoever that are in the outward world's essence, and introduce them into another essence; but the vanity in the outward air's dominion has brought a darkness thereinto, so that the soul does not know itself. The curse of God has cast the defiled child into the dirt, that it must pray for a laver; and must be in this lifetime its own enemy, that it may learn to be humble, and continue in the divine harmony, and not become a devil.
The Eighteenth Chapter
Of the Paradisical State * showing how it should have been if Adam had not fallen
* Dominion, life or condition
1. I KNOW the sophist will here cavil at me, and cry it down as a thing impossible for me to know, seeing I was not there and saw it myself: To him I say, that I, in the essence of my soul and body, when I was not as yet I, but when I was in Adam's essence, was there, and did myself fool away [negligently lose] my glory in Adam. But seeing Christ has restored it again unto me, I see, in the spirit of Christ, what I was in Paradise; and what I now am in sin; and what I shall be again.
And therefore let none cry it out as a thing unknowable; for although I indeed know it not, yet the spirit of Christ knows it in me; from which knowledge I shall write.
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